The New Left Revisited (Critical Perspectives on the Past)
"Is there anything left to be said about the New Left? The answer is a resounding yes. John McMillian's useful introduction and Paul Buhle's inspired concluding ruminations provide bookends for twelve original and insightful essays. Consonant with the best impulses of social history, The New Left Revisited offers detailed, textured, and nuanced accounts of New Left radicalism." New England Quarterly "This excellent collection of essays on the New Left helps mark the coming of age of a rising generation of scholars, too young to have experienced the 1960s but committed to bringing new scholarly questions to the study of the decade." --Alan Brinkley, Columbia University, and author of Liberalism and Its Discontents "From 'Was the New Left new?' to 'Did the New Left die and if so, why?' to 'What was the role of women in the draft resistance movement?' with a dozen case studies by a new generation of leftist scholars, this amazing collection asks new questions and sparkles with new insights and brilliance on every page." --Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, Professor in Ethnic Studies and Women's Studies, California State University "You'll be amazed at how much you think you know about the Sixties is wrong--especially if you've read the standard works on the subject. This is an agenda-setting anthology, adventurous and rigorous in equal measure." --Rick Perlstein, author of Before the Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus "This impressive collection of essays re-examining the "New Left" movements of the 1960s is written by a new generation of scholars detached from the events they are recounting. Because they are not former activists, they offer a refreshing alternative to the often-acrimonious memoirs of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) and antiwar leaders. They particularly take to task Todd Gitlin and members of the SDS for inflating their roles within the Left, and reject the "good sixties," "bad sixties" approach favored by ex-radicals. By focusing on events not widely reported, particularly in Los Angeles; Cambridge, Maryland; and Carbondale, Illinois, they remind readers of how diverse the New Left was. Particularly good are essays by David McBride, Gregg Michel, and Peter Levy, which superbly delineate the often-bizarre coalitions formed in order to confront local authorities. From police brutality to curfew laws, these activists tackled problems less remote than the Vietnam War. This welcome collection challenges the pessimism of former radicals and exposes the opportunism of "the second God that failed," ex-activists turned conservatives. The final essay by Paul Buhle helps place to rest the notion that leftist radicals ruined the sixties. An outstanding collection. Summing Up: Essential. All levels/libraries." --D. R. Turner, Davis and Elkins College, Choice "Well, this is an interesting book for us old fogies who work on the social movements of the 1960s! ...the book as a whole is provocative and fascinating, reshaping our understanding of the new left, democratizing it, perhaps." --The American Journal of Sociology