Survey of Local Democratic Cleavages

As the authors of Crashing the Gate, a netroots essential, have written, liberals need to stop infighting to have a chance of moving forward on the national political stage. On a local level, in a situation dominated by Democrats, it's not so bad: you've got a big Democratic pie, and you're fighting to distribute it. But on a bigger scale, these street-level divisions are crucially important to resolve.

Three traditionally liberal groups that University of Chicago students are familiar with include students (duh), Blacks, and labor unions. Unfortunately, these groups don't always get along perfectly in Chicago.

You may have seen copies of the free weekly Black newspaper N'Digo (note: a saucy soul soundtrack awaits anyone who actually clicks this link) lying around the waiting rooms of various Hyde Park businesses. I picked up the latest issue yesterday at Lung Wah on 53rd, and there was an interesting editorial on a division between Blacks and labor.

The editorial's author, N'Digo publisher Hermene D. Hartman, describes the efforts of unions to target Aldermen they consider to be anti-union. So far it sounds like a reasonable thing for a union to do. Since unions are such an important way to organize liberal votes around the country, I actually wish they would do more of it.

But the problem for Hartman is that (a) many of the targeted Aldermen are highly regarded leaders in the Black community and (b) many of the unions haven't done a good job of accepting Black members into their ranks. It's quite a shame, since unions and Blacks could gain quite a bit from cooperating--in particular, getting more Black laborers organized would be a proverbial win-win situation.

Students have fewer common interests with unions and Blacks. Moreover, sometimes students have trouble getting involved in local issues. We're not from here, we're only here for a couple years, etc. But the University and the community are stuck with each other, and the administration is the permanent face of students to the community. This hasn't always worked out well.

The University has a bad history of trampling neighborhood interests in the name of redevelopment, which still creates resentment. Hyde Park has been "successfully" gentrified over the past 40 years, but the Woodlawn neighborhood (south of the Midway) has not been interfered with to the same degree. But as the University expands operations there with the construction of a big new dorm, old tensions come bubbling back to the surface.

On a more positive note, recent activism by the SOUL group to encourage the University to negotiate a better contract with about 600 of its unionized employees was a welcome example of cross-group cooperation. It's probably also a good example of really the best action students can take: pressuring the University, as our representative, to deal respectfully and fairly with local groups.