FROM THE “WALK FOR ADEQUATE WELFARE” TO THE “MARCH FOR OUR LIVES”: WELFARE RIGHTS ORGANIZING IN THE 1960S AND 1990S

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Abstract
Implementing progressive policies to eliminate poverty requires political action by poor people that is grounded in their lived experiences and analyses. Consequently, it is crucial that we analyze the goals and strategies of poor people's organizations. In this paper, I compare welfare rights organizing in the 1960s to the antipoverty movement that began growing in the 1990s. Both periods have seen significant changes in welfare policy, but the different political and economic contexts have significantly shaped the way that poor people articulate the problems that they are facing and the manner in which they develop a collective response. Additionally, the contemporary movement is shaped by analyses of the strategies employed in the 1960s. A comparison of the National Welfare Rights Organization (1960s) and the Kensington Welfare Rights Union (1990s) reveals important differences including: (1) a shift to multiracial organizing; (2) an insistence today that poor people assume leadership and control of the movement; (3) a shift from a focus on welfare rights and a guaranteed income to human rights and the right to living wage jobs; (4) attempts today to build a movement of both the unemployed poor and the working poor as well as to build alliances with the labor movement; and (5) a shift away from attempts to influence the Democratic party to attempts to influence the United Nations as part of a broader strategy of resistance based on the politics of scale. [Key words: urban social movements, welfare reform, human rights.]