Decision Time for Our Movements with Bill Fletcher

Come hear Bill Fletcher speak about strategies for social change that will help us move off the sidelines to the center of the national debate as a full-fledged “player”.

 

Bill is co-author of Solidarity Divided: The Crisis in Organized Labor and A New Path toward Social Justice. He is past Education Director of the AFL-CIO, SEIU Field Services Director, & President/CEO of TRANSAFRICA. He is the Director of Field Services & Education of the American Federation of Government Employees.

 

This program will also feature a presentation of the Majority Agenda Project, a Massachusetts-based effort building a strategic multi-issue agenda to promote collaboration across movements in order to have a more effective response to the present crisis.

 

Sponsored by the Majority Agenda Project and the Simmons Institute for Leadership and Change.  Call 617-497-5273 for more information.

 

Background

War, Extremism, Global Warming, Economic Crisis, Health Care. The crises we face everywhere you look today are not isolated problems. They are completely intertwined. We can’t stop war as long as we pursue energy resources around the world – the very fossil fuels that have created the climate catastrophe we now face. We can’t reverse our economic crisis without massive investment in green jobs. We can’t stop extremism as long as we must force privatization, deregulation and corporate globalization on the rest of the world. This economic model that has intensified the climate crisis and lies at the root of our economic crisis. Bailing out Wall Street and escalating in Afghanistan alone fritter away a trillion dollars needed to prevent foreclosures, put people to work, keep services in place, and build a green economy. ;

Nor are the solutions to this complex crisis isolated: A green economy creates the good jobs needed to solve our economic crisis. It frees up billions now spent on military policies focused on controlling fossil fuel energy sources abroad. Single-payer health insurance removes the economic burden now crushing families and employers and reduces out of control public and private debt that strangles economic recovery. Replacing the NAFTA and W.T.O “Free Trade” regime with “Fair Trade” promotes global justice and economic self-determination. These alternative policies, together with eliminating the burden of hundreds of military bases and the hundreds of billions to maintain them in other countries, would significantly undermine the dynamics that lead to violent extremism.

The college is accessible by the E-train on the Green Line, the #47 bus out of Central Square Cambridge, and by buses out of Kenmore Square. Paid parking is available at the Landmark Center and the Beth Israel Hospital Garages. Limited paid parking is available to Visa card holders in the Simmons Parking Lot, off Louis Pasteur Ave next to Boston Latin High School.