Contesting Colonial Capitalism in the Americas, Africa, and Asia

Dip Kapoor is with the Center for Research & Development Solidarity (CRDS), an Adivasi-Dalit Indigenous and landless peasant organization in India and is a Professor (University of Alberta) in International Development Education working with Indigenous, peasant, and migrant worker social movements in the exploitation colonies. His co-edited collections with Dr. Aziz Choudry include, Learning from the Ground-Up: Global Perspectives on Social Movements and Knowledge Production (2010) and NGOization: Complicity, Contradictions and Prospects (2009). Research, Political Engagement and Dispossession: Indigenous, Peasant and Urban Poor Activisms in the Americas and Asia (2020) (with Steven Jordan) and Against Colonization and Rural Dispossession: Local Resistance in South & East Asia, the Pacific and Africa (2017) are other recent collections.

"If there is one word that defines the work and life of Aziz Choudry it is 'struggle'. What better way to honor our fallen comrade than to assemble stories of struggle – powerful, incisive histories of the dispossessed, the colonized, the exploited, the oppressed, the insurgent laboring classes who believe another world is possible if we are willing to struggle." Robin D. G. Kelley, author of Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination, UCLA, USA."Today, after many decades, we see the growth of a new mood in the Global South. This mood, however, is not the same as a spirit. It is merely a hint of a new possibility. We have to study this mood and understand it to see its democratic possibilities. Aziz Choudry (1966-2021) had a way of learning things quickly and then conveying them with clarity. He would have hated a grave. It had a finality that was against his optimism. This collection is the best way to honour his legacy. It is an opening to struggles, to more struggles, to the socialism that he worked his life to build."Vijay Prashad, author of The Darker Nations and Executive Director, Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research."This book is a testament to the collective power of Indigenous, migrant, and peasant movements to change the international political horizon. Analyzing the activism of peoples' movements contesting the catastrophic power of colonial-capitalism around the world, this collection offers an inspiring vision for a just and humanizing world."Sunera Thobani, author of Exalted Subjects: Studies in the Making of Race and Nation in Canada, University of British Colombia, Canada."An extraordinary collection of essays in memory of Dr. Aziz Choudry and a powerful testament to his seminal work on social movements as instructive sites of knowledge production. A gem of an archive of the lessons we need to learn from contemporary struggles in Africa, Asia, and the Americas."Sangeeta Kamat, University of Massachusetts Amherst, USA and author of Development Hegemony: NGOs and the State in India. "This eclectic collection of case studies and reflections revisits core lessons from Aziz Choudry’s life and work, while adding meaning from contributors' specific geographic/movement locations and building resistance to colonising capitalism. This book will raise your spirits, stimulate your thinking, and send you back into the struggle with renewed energy."Bob Boughton, University of New England, Australia and author of Adult Literacy, Land Rights and Self Determination. "A remarkable tribute to Aziz Choudry, this is a collection of brilliant and insightful essays by activist-intellectuals on key communities that Aziz dedicated his life to – migrants, peasants, and indigenous peoples."Biju Mathews, author of Taxi Cabs and Capitalism in New York City, Rider University, USA."This book is a heart-warming and fitting tribute to our late friend and comrade Aziz Choudry. Reflecting the geographical breadth and depth of Aziz’s engagements with global struggles, the chapters move between critical and theoretical analysis and the grassroots insights of people on the ground. A must read."Mario Novelli, University of Sussex, UK and author of Laboratories of Learning: Social Movements, Education and Knowledge-making in the Global South. "This collection of essays is a powerful testament to the breadth and depth of Aziz Choudry's activism and research/education work. The thinking and relationships he inspired and nurtured live on!"GRAIN, https://grain.org/"This book is a superb resource combining deep analytical insights with an abiding commitment to a better world. Contesting Colonial Capitalism rigorously tracks the worldwide assaults on Indigenous peoples, peasants, and landless workers, Black women, and migrant laborers. More than this, however, it shows how all these groups are resisting colonial capitalism – from India to Brazil, from the Philippines to Palestine, and beyond. What a stunning tribute to the scholarship and radical commitments of the late Aziz Choudry and to the dreams of all in the Americas, Africa, and Asia who insist that another world really is possible."David McNally, Director, Project on Race and Capitalism, University of Houston, USA.“This powerful searing tribute to the brilliant and courageous Dr. Aziz Choudry, is a must-read and a much-needed call to action. Sharing lessons from myriad struggles for social, economic, and environmental justice, it quilts a blueprint for cross-border and cross-issue organizing to cement global solidarity for the dispossessed. It leaves you knowing that Another World is Possible." Anuradha Mittal, Oakland Institute, USA https://www.oaklandinstitute.org/

• 1. Introduction Americas/Caribbean 2. The Worldwide Reach of Aziz Choudry 3. Learning about Living Treaties 4. Resurgence Amidst Extractivist Empires: Reframing Decolonization Movements Through Land Back, Community Resurgence and Sustainable Self-Determination 5. Genocide Informed Awareness: Understanding the Impact of the Crime on Indigenous Peoples 6. Remembering Putis: State, Earth, and the Indigenous Ordinary in the Peruvian Andes 7. An Activist Archive of Photo-Journalism: The Global Justice Ecology Project and Indigenous, Ecological and Anti-capitalist Advocacy in the Americas 8. The Educational Foundations of the Brazilian Landless Workers Movement: A Dialogue with Aziz Choudry 9. Underdogs: The Dehumanization of Caribbean Migrant Agricultural Labor and Colonial Capitalist Orders 10. ‘Our Research is Driven by Our Politics’: Red Thread, Women’s Unwaged Caring Work and Organizing Through Time-Use in Guyana 11. Neoliberal Austerity, Black Feminist Politics, and the Exploitation of Black Women’s Motherwork in Rural Education in Jamaica 12. An Invisible Act of Resistance: Remembering Labor Struggles Against the Argentine 1976 Dictatorship Africa 13. The Rise of Anti-immigrant Organisations in South Africa: Lessons from Comrade Aziz Choudry’s Praxis 14. Ubuhlalism as a Universal Pedagogical Praxis 15. Agrarian Contestations and Capital Frontiers in Africa 16. Fighting Extinction Technology: The Story of a Movement 17. The Weathervane Activist Politics of Accumulation by Dispossession: Radio Ada Charting a Path of Clarity in the Midst of Ambiguous Social Movement Learning 18. Ogoni Women’s Nonviolent Resistance Against Petro-capitalist Violence Asia 19. Uprooted: Dispossession, Refugees and Migrant Labour in the Middle East and Palestine 20. Learning From Colonial Capitalist History: The Forced Migration of Filipino Migrant Workers, Migrant Worker Organizing and Contestations 21. Supply Chain Fabrications and Dreams of Smart Wages in Bangladesh’s Garment Industry 22. Building Resistance Among Small and Landless Peasants in the Face of Trade Liberalisation of the Dairy and Livestock Sector in Pakistan 23. The Movement is the School: Political Learning in the 2020 Farmers Occupation in India 24. Indigenous and Peasant Political Struggles Contesting Neo/Colonial Racial Capitalist 25. Afterword