ABSTRACT

Political participation in America—supposedly the world’s strongest democracy—is startlingly low, and many of the civil rights and economic equity initiatives that were instituted in the 1960s and '70s have been abandoned, as significant proportions of the populace seem to believe that the civil rights battle has been won. However, rates of collective engagement, like community activism, are surprisingly high. In Resisting Citizenship, renowned feminist political scientist Martha Ackelsberg argues that community activism may hold important clues to reviving democracy in this time of growing bureaucratization and inequality.

This book brings together many of Ackelsberg’s writings over the past 25 years, combining her own field work and interviews with cutting edge research and theory on democracy and activism. She explores these efforts in order to draw lessons—and attempt to incorporate knowledge—about current notions of democracy from those who engage in "non-traditional" participation, those who have, in many respects, been relegated to the margins of political life in the United States.

chapter |9 pages

Introduction

From Resisting the Canon to Resisting Citizenship

part |45 pages

Rethinking Politics/Rethinking Community

chapter |13 pages

Communities, Resistance, and Women's Activism

Reflections on Democratic Theory

chapter |17 pages

Terrains of Protest

Striking City Women

part |58 pages

Challenging Dichotomies

chapter |11 pages

Dependency or Mutuality †

A Feminist Perspective on Dilemmas of Welfare Policy

chapter |16 pages

Privacy, Publicity, and Power †

A Feminist Rethinking of the Public–Private Distinction

chapter |15 pages

Gender, Resistance, and Citizenship

Women's Struggles with/in the State

chapter |14 pages

Rethinking Anarchism/Rethinking Power

A Contemporary Feminist Perspective

part |81 pages

Is Citizenship the Goal?

chapter |14 pages

Exclusion or Inclusion?

The Ambiguities of Citizenship

chapter |20 pages

Women's Community Activism and the Rejection of “Politics”

Some Dilemmas of Popular Democratic Movements

chapter |14 pages

Families, Care and Citizenship

Notes toward a Feminist Approach

chapter |17 pages

Democracy and (in)Equality †

Community Activism and Democracy in a Time of Retrenchment