Fearless CitiesImmigrant rightsNews

Creating Solidarity with Immigrants and Refugees

on June 12, 2017

How are cities being fearless when it comes to its immigrant and undocumented citizens? Is San Francisco calling itself a Sanctuary City enough, or how can we change our city to be fearless in the face of xenophobia?

A policy roundtable entitled Sanctuary and Refuge Cities was presented on the last day of the Fearless Cities Summit by Xristina Moschovidou (Kilkis, Greece), Ignasi Calvó (Barcelona, Spain), Liora Danan (New York City, U.S.A.), Daniel Gutierrez (Berlin, Germany) and Amélie Canonne (Paris, France).

Though coming from five very different regions, the overarching theme was that there can’t be parallel systems in place inside a single municipality. When we construct a separate system for immigrants within an existing system that is built to exclude them, we aren’t creating actual solidarity. Instead, the system needs to be rebuilt so that the same basic public services (legal services, healthcare, public safety, education, etc.) are accessible on the same level for every citizen. And these services need to be genuinely accessible for all – what’s the point of providing access to healthcare if patients can’t communicate with their doctors?

Once emergency needs are met for new citizens, how can we continue supporting them to ensure they thrive alongside existing members? For example, are helping them find jobs and forging relationships with unions for economic solidarity? Most importantly, we need to ensure there are entryways available for new citizens to be involved in policymaking and decision making, regardless of documented status. It’s time to stop talking about immigrants and start talking with them.

The title of Sanctuary City is a slight misnomer considering local municipalities can’t provide full protections against federal policy, including ICE raids against our neighbors. Even as recently as a week ago, members of our chapter attended a rally to stop the deportations of Hugo Mejía and Rodrigo Núñez, two gentlemen who were recently detained by ICE in a neighboring area. While we may not have the powers in place to stop these events, we can and will continue to show fearlessness and solidarity with our immigrant and undocumented neighbors as we work to build a truly fearless and welcoming city in San Francisco.

Fearless CitiesNewsSocialist feminism

The Feminization of Politics

on June 11, 2017

Fearless Cities opened on Saturday with a plenary session of leaders from Barcelona en Comú. It was held in the basilica of the Universitat de Barcelona, with the speakers taking their place far from the pews, behind a table that had been set up in front of the altar. The deputy mayor, Gerardo Pisarello, joked that it was unfortunate that the panel was seated in such a high place, but that, perhaps, it was just, and just about time—time for women to take their place in such institutions.

The plenary session was entitled The Feminization of Politics. For Barcelona en Comú, this concept is more than a commitment to feminist issues. It represents an entire reconfiguration of political practice. Barcelona’s Councilor for Feminisms, Laura Pérez Castaño, spoke about four of the key practices necessary for realizing this concept.

  1. Parity between women and men, between the masculine and the feminine. Not content with the mere legal equality inherited from liberal traditions of the past, Castaño envisions an end to the marginalization of feminine concepts and knowledge. We can imagine a world where female victims of sexual violence are not automatically treated with suspicion, or where knowledge about child care is taken just as seriously as more traditionally male pursuits.
  2. Reduction of verticality. Horizontalizing our political spaces will require ensuring that all are speaking in equal proportion, and that all are listening equally as well. To get there, we must recognize the outsize role that men can often take up in public debate. It will require consulting experts, less often from the universities and more often from the territories actually affected by policy.
  3. Inclusion of women and domestic workers. This means holding meetings at all hours of the day, not always in the evenings! It means providing predictable child care and publicizing it. And it means always being vigilant when it comes to who can participate in the meetings.
  4. Centrality of gender in our politics. The feminization of politics is not guaranteed, even for Barcelona en Comú. Achieving it is an ongoing struggle and dialectic within our organizations. With that in mind, we must not fail to center gender in our analysis and practice, because only then will we accomplish this vision of a more universal politics.

These concepts surfaced many more times over the course of the weekend, informing our discussions of economic justice, building power, radical democracy, and many other issues. We’re excited to do everything we can to help bring this idea back into our chapter, to see how it can inform our organizing and political practice. Look out for more posts soon!

Fearless Cities

Fearless Cities, Day 1

on June 10, 2017

I’m writing this in the top floor of a Galician hole in the wall with what appears to be a large contingent of the Barcelona en Comú election team. David from Barcelona en Comú brought us here, promising great seafood. The election team is extremely young. There’s some confusion about how much octopus to order, but none such about how much beer.

We came here after the kickoff rally in Plaça dels Àngels, where we heard Barcelona’s mayor Ada Colau speak with Manuela Carmena, the mayor of Madrid. The two women spoke of their friendship, how they are not only political allies but close friends, the more they visit each other’s cities. Ada said that we need to break down the walls that prevent citizens from entering politics: the professionalism, the cronyism, the elitism that insists that only the elite understand what we need to do. Funny how that always means doubling down on neoliberalism.

Ada said that our politicians should go back to their real lives after serving a term; that our representatives must be members of the community, not enter a revolving door between the private sphere and a public sector that doesn’t actually serve citizens. She’s an inspiring example because she truly shows that any of us are fit to lead our own community groups, neighborhoods, and even cities.. Only we, the people, know what is to be done. The false elitism of our current system of governance is an illusion. The real ground of contention in all political questions is not how to execute a bloodless technocratic consensus, but rather what ought to be the configuration of society, and who gets what. Only by breaking this illusion of great technical difficulty will we overcome our doubts and seize power.

Earlier in the day, another comrade from Britain called out another illusion, one that has trapped us in the status quo: the idea that currently existing political configurations are a natural fact. We’ve got to realize that what is not possible in San Francisco alone may be tackled at a regional level, with new alliances between municipalities, creating issue constituencies that cut across currently existing legal structures. For example, housing access across the entire San Francisco Peninsula and Bay Area is an inextricably regional issue, and when we have conversations about policy interventions in just San Francisco, we artificially limit ourselves and the scope of possible solutions.

Finally, a shout out! Ada reminded me of all my women comrades in the DSA SF who are running for Steering Committee. Impostor syndrome is a real thing, and undeniably affects women more than men. So, thank you for believing in yourselves that you can lead us. In shattering your personal illusions, you are a wonderful example to us all—just as is Ada Colau, just as we must all believe that only we can lead ourselves.