Under the banner of environmental justice, for example, numerous practical alliances have emerged which bring together experienced activists, affected communities, government agencies, and businesses. Highlighting the practical over the ideological, these alliances build bridges based upon common need and provide reasons for the unpoliticized to participate. Second, we agree that national efforts should expand community power. One component of this effort is to disseminate otherwise private information in ways that are useful to community groups. Another component is to facilitate the organization of groups which arguably advance public purposes.
Laws enabling labor organization come immediately to mind.
Other possibilities include public subsidies to organizers of neighborhood groups, and associations of parents or health care clients. The understanding of how such power-devolving strategies work, and the specific measures which might advance them, is still quite crude and thus presents promising territory for joint exploration by intellectuals and activists. That prize, we think, is the one toward which local and national agendas ought to strive. Finally, we generally agree with the content of Flacks' national agenda, but as stated, most of the items are boring, old- left issues. They are boring partly because they result from an a priori style of reasoning rather than an organic process.