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| Date | Event |
| Wed June 17 |
Boston DSA Forum |
| Mon June 29 |
Meet the author of |
| Tues June 30 |
Debs-Thomas-Bernstein Award Reception |
| Thurs July 9 |
Boston DSA Executive Board & Members Meeting 2nd Thursday of every month 7:00 to 9:00 pm at Harvest Food Coop Community Room 581 Massachusetts Ave., Cambridge (Central Sq. T stop) All the way to the rear of the store and up the stairs. |
| Sunday July 12 |
BOSTON DSA MEMBERS’ DISCUSSION MEETING & BAR-B-Q Health Care Reform in the Obama Age President Obama has expressed a commitment to health care reform, and this country has finally reached the point where there is near-universal agreement that the present “system” (for want of a better word) is broken. We may have a better chance to attain national health care in the next year than ever before. But what kind? We are consistently told that Single Payer – the simple, effective, Canadian-style system that DSA favors – is “off the table”, and the creaky, cumbersome Massachusetts system is being held up as a national model – even as we read repeated newspaper accounts of how our system has failed completely to bring costs under control. So what role for Single Payer activists in the present debate? |
See the Yankee Radical for more information on these events. (Note: Web announcements may preceed Yankee Radical publication. Or not.)
| Date | Event |
| Wed Feb 25 2009 |
Boston DSA Forum Speakers: The American worker and union organizers face steep legal and employer-based opposition during unionization drives. Our speakers discussed the benefits that unions have brought to workers, even those who are not themselves in unions, and to democracy, in general. Most discussion focused on the Employee Free Choice Act, pending legislation would make it easier to democratically form unions with majority-sign up, make it easier for new unions to force employers to fairly negotiate contracts, and create stiffer penalties for union busting. |
| Mon Nov 11 2008 |
Boston DSA Post-Election Forum Obama's Victory: What Happened? What Next? Speakers: Frances Moore Lappe, Tim Costello & Frank Llewllyn What does Obama’s historic victory mean for the progressive coalition that backed him? What will be the effect of the massive grassroots movement that brought him into office? Are we in for four more years of neoliberalism with a Democratic face, or does the left have enough muscle to push for a "New New Deal"? About 40 people joined us at the Democracy Center in Harvard Square to discuss these questions. Our speakers drew on their lifetimes of social activism, to present a range of different perspectives. At the reception after the forum, we were able to continue the discussion more informally, as well as share some Socialist socializing and food and drink. Frances Moore Lappe is the author of several books, beginning in 1971 with Diet for a Small Planet. She helped launch the Institute for Food and Development Policy (Food First), and — in 2002 — the Small Planet Institute, which promotes global democracy and environmentally sustainable development. U Decide 2008, a recent Institute project, targeted undecided voters with flyers comparing the records and positions of Obama and McCain on specific issues. She is also on the Advisory Board of the Union of Concerned Scientists, and was selected by the Women’s National Book Association as one of the 12 living “women whose words have changed the world”. Tim Costello is a longtime labor activist and former truck driver who helped organize the North American Alliance for Fair Employment, a network of 65 unions and community groups in the U.S. and Canada. He is currently on the Advisory Board of the UMass Boston Labor Resource Center, and is Co-Director of Global Labor Strategies (www.globallaborblog.org). Tim is also co-author of Global Village or Global Pillage: Economic Reconstruction from the Bottom Up, now out in paperback. Frank Llewellyn is the National Director of Democratic Socialists of America, and is on the Board of NY Citizen Action. |
| Thurs Sept 27 2007 |
Boston DSA'S Debs-Thomas-Bernstein Award Reception Honoring Marie Kennedy & Chris Tilly
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| Wed April 25, 2007 |
Boston Democratic Socialists of America/MIT Young Democratic Socialists Forum The Pink Tide: Resistance and Regeneration in Latin America speakers: Maria Aguiar, Grassroots International* [unable to attend because of an injury] Peter Winn, Tufts University* Jose Antonio Lucero, Temple University* Kendra Fehrer, Martin Luther King, Jr. Bolivarian Circle* * Organizational affiliation given for identification, only. Since the Monroe Doctrine, if not before, the United States has regarded the Americas south its national borders as its own private sphere of interest, feeling free to meddle in its economies or national governments at will. Most recently, this has taken the form of pushing a neoliberal "free trade" agenda on the region, where "free trade" is interpreted as providing an ideal environment for investment and profit by global capital. The agenda has been typified by crippling national debt, "structural adjustment" programs that curtail social services, and a model of export led growth that has devastated local economies. This agenda has become known as the "Washington Consensus". In the past decade, or so, resistance to this neoliberal "consensus" has been growing in the region. Resistance has many forms, all interrelated: growing mass movements of the poor; increasing self-organization of small producers, agrarian or otherwise; factory takeovers by working people; electoral victories by socialist and other left-leaning political parties... The electoral victories have resulted in governments based on, or at least legitimately responding to, the underlying mass movements. New policies of these governments have included efforts to restructure debt, repudiate the neoliberal "structural adjustments", increase regional economic cooperation, and invite trade and investment from non-US sources such as Spain and China - in short, to build a model of regional prosperity and independence, out from under the thumb of the US government and international corporate investors. Our speakers, scholars and activists of the Left, with deep involvement in Latin America, led an engaging discussion of these issues. Event was held at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge MA. |
| Thurs April 19, 2007 |
MIT Young Democratic Socialists Forum Towards a Post-Capitalist World: An Evening with Authors Gar Alperovitz and David Schweickart moderated by Democratic Socialists of America National Steering Committee Chair Joe Schwartz, (Prof. of Political Science, Temple University) Is there a better way to organize society than the predator/prey system of capitalism? Is there a way to achieve socialism without creating a totalitarian society? Or, is it true, as British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher said, that "There is No Alternative"? Professors Gar Alperovitz and David Schweickart joined us for a lively discussion about what a post-capitalist world will really look like, visions of which which both have outlined in their books, America Beyond Capitalism: Reclaiming Our Wealth, Our Liberty, and Our Democracy and After Capitalism. Event was held at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge MA. |
| Sun Sept 24 2006 |
Debs-Thomas-Bernstein Award Reception 4-6 pm, at the home of , 8 Dunstable Road, Cambridge MA Boston DSA presented its 27th Debs-Thomas-Bernstein Award to Massachusetts Neighbor to Neighbor Director Harris Gruman, at the Cambridge Home of 2001 Michael Harrington Award recipient John Maher and his wife Ellen Sarkisian. A former Boston DSA chair, Harris began organizing for social and economic justice in the mid-1980's. Since joining Neighbor to Neighbor, he has led successful campaigns to increase child care funding , win progressive tax reform, and raise the minimum wage, as well as helping to elect numerous progressive's to Congress and the state legislature. Proceeds from went to support the work of Boston DSA and the Mass Alliance, a coalition of unions, civil rights, environmental and community groups which endorses and campaigns for progressive candidates in State legislative elections. The afternoon also showcased the Alliance as a successful example of how progressives can organize at the grassroots level for real political change |
| Mar 3, 2005 |
Boston DSA Forum After Capitalism - Socialist Alternatives A Talk and Discussion with David Schweickart (Professor of Philosophy, Loyola Univerisity, Chicago) plus a panel of discussants: Harris Gruman (Neighbor to Neighbor & DSA), Noémi Gizspenc and Chris Mackin (Ownership Associates), Pasqualino Colombaro (labor & community activist) The rule of global capital sometimes seems undefeatable, and the intellectual victory of its primary theology — classical economics — often seems complete. Is this unjust, plutocratic system really the best we can do? In this forum, David Schweickart presented his ideas for an alternative to global capitalism that he calls "Economic Democracy". Event sponsors included: Democratic Socialists of America, Tellus Institute, Massachusetts Global Action, GEO (Grassroots Economic Organizing), Dollars & Sense, Committees of Correspondence for Democracy & Socialism (Boston chapter), Freedom Road Socialist Organization (Boston). |
| Dec 8, 2003 |
Democratic Socialists of America Forum: Women and Globalization speakers: Maria M. Aguiar, Global Program Director, Grassroots International* Dr. Elaine Bernard, Director, Labor & Workplace Program, Harvard Law School* Dr. Ellen Israel Rosen, Women's Studies Research Ctr, Brandeis University* (author of "Making Sweatshops", a book on the globalization of the textile and apparel industries.) *Affiliations are given for identification purposes. Three distinguished scholars and activists discuss the effects on women of an economy increasingly global in its relentless pursuit of a low-wage work force. A 2-CD complete audio recording of this event is available for purchase - contact Boston DSA. |
| June 26, 2003 | 2003 Debs-Thomas-Bernstein Awards Honoring Leaders for Social & Economic Justice Ed Collins, Vice President of the Massachusetts AFL-CIO Khalida Smalls of Alternatives for Community and Environment, coordinator of the T Rider’s Union. |
| Nov 21, 2002 | National Day of Action against Wal-Mart For more information on the Wal-Mart campaign check out Ellen Rosen's article in the Yankee Radical. and see http://dsausa.org/lowwage/lowwage.html,. |
| Sept 28, 2002 | Boston DSA September Retreat: Labor Action in support of Shaws/Star Market workers. (Boston Indy Media article.) |
| June 13, 2002 | 25th Annual Debs-Thomas-Bernstein Awards Honoring Women of the House State Representatives Pat Jehlen and Anne Paulson |
| June 12, 2001 | Debs-Thomas-Bernstein Reception honoring Ed Clark, Dessima Williams and John Maher |
| Oct 30, 2001 | Forum on Welfare, Children and Families: The Impact of Welfare Reform with William Julius Wilson |
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AFSC Videos of Past BGAN Events [Note: The website with these videos seems to be broken, but I'm leaving the links here in the hope that it will come back online. -- webmaster]
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