The politics of crisis and a crisis of politics

Different ideological orientations and organizational structures in the Los Angeles antirape movement influenced how the organizations approached particular tasks and dilemmas during the early years of the movement. These hybrid organizations sometimes uneasily combined political work and service provision. The demands of the work chosen, relationships with outside agencies, and funding needs produced a trend toward a social service framework. Nevertheless, activists whose starting point was feminist politics resisted and interrupted the accompanying bureaucratization and depoliticization of rape.