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Storming the Millennium: The New Politics of Change
Storming the Millennium The New Politics of Change Author:Tim Jordan, Adam Lent A new politics of change is coming into being across the industrialised world. Active and rebellious, this new politics is redefining radicalism. It encompasses a broad range of issues - sexuality, gender, drugs, roads, ethnicity, cyberspace, democracy, music - and ventures into areas the timid political establishment does its best to avoid... more ». As the new millennium begins, activists are reflecting on their struggles, and journalists and intellectuals are recognising the importance of the new politics. Storming the Millennium is the foremost book to bring a range of these activists and intellectuals together in one volume. The book provides some of the first histories of the movements that are at the core of new politics and grapples with the important political and theoretical issues they raise, through interviews and analyses. Bringing together new and established writers, Storming the Millennium is in two parts. In the first part, there are five analyses of specific movements. Rupa Huq analyses the relationship between 'rave' and dance culture and the British Government's draconian legislation, the Criminal Justice Act. Peter Beresford takes up the story of how disabled people and psychiatric survivors have struggled to ensure they participate in political change. Merl Storr analyses recent shifts in the bisexual movement from resistance to oppression to the recognition of networks of power permeating sexualities. Patrick Field explores attacks on road-building within the context of ecological danger. Finally, Tim Jordan provides the first detailed analysis of an Internet based political organisation, the USA based Electronic Frontier Foundation, and finds both grassroots defence and elite empowerment. The second part of Storming the Millennium explores different ways of analysing the significance of new politics. Sanjay Sharma and Shirin Housee explore a community's response to racist murders in the context of discussions around the importance of identities such as 'black' or 'Asian' to anti-racist struggles. Pam Alldred interviews USA analyst Nancy Fraser, exploring the relationship between redistributive and identity politics. Tim Jordan analyses different definitions of exploitation and liberation, arguing for the left to carry itself forward into a radical politics of many definitions of liberation. Tony Fitzpatrick outlines the often neglected world of 'self-help' social welfare and its relationship to the failing welfare state. Adam Lent explores internal divisions within political movements and argues for novel political identities. Finally, Tessa Bird and Tim Jordan interview Stuart Hall, Doreen Massey and Michael Rusting, exploring the relationship between new politics and the New Left, the value of still calling oneself a socialist and whether class remains the key political framework. Storming the Millennium includes exhilarating stories of resistance and change, alongside complex yet accessible analyses of the nature of current radical politics.« less