Frances Fox Piven – författare

Challenging Authority argues that ordinary people exercise extraordinary political courage and power in American politics when, frustrated by politics as usual, they rise up in anger and hope and defy the authorities and the status quo rules that ordinarily govern their daily lives. By doing so, they disrupt the workings of important institutions and become a force in American politics. Drawing on critical episodes in American history, Frances Fox Piven shows that it is precisely at those seismic moments when people act outside of self-restricting political norms that they become empowered to their full democratic potential.

From the Roaring Twenties through to the Great Depression, Irving Bernstein presents a comprehensive history of the American workforce. The Lean Years is the first instalment of Bernstein's critically acclaimed trilogy on the American labour movement which charts how the New Deal and labour unions preserved democracy and capitalism at a time when the survival of both was unclear. This classic text revolutionises social history, vividly narrating an era of wrenching hardships but also great victories in the workers' movement.

A groundbreaking moment in the discourse of the labour movement and a classic text which revolutionised social history. Bernstein uncovers a period when industrial trade unionism, working-class power and socialism became a rallying cry for millions of workers; from fields, mills, mines and factories. This is the second instalment of Bernstein's critically acclaimed trilogy on the American labour movement which charts how the New Deal and labour unions preserved democracy and capitalism at a time when the survival of both was unclear.

Francis Fox Piven, a celebrated political thinker and activist, offers a concise introduction to her award-winning writings on imperialism, voting and poverty as it relates to the Occupy Wall Street movement. Piven offers a clear historical context to the current struggles around economic disparity, poverty and imperialism and relates them to the labour, civil rights and anti-imperialist struggles of the Depression era. Through examining the past, Piven presents the immense future possibilities of the Occupy Movement.