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United for Peace of Pierce County: Digging Deeper X: September 10, 2007
Saul Alinsky,
Rules for Radicals: A Practical Primer for Realistic Radicals
(New York: Vintage, 1989). Orig. publ. 1971
Personal Acknowledgements. JasonEpstein, Cicely Nichols, Susan Rabiner,and Georgia Harper (editors).Epigraphs: Rabbi Hillel, Thomas Paine[whence the title of Sanford Horwitt’s1989 biography,
Let Them Call MeRebel
], Saul Alinsky.
Prologue.
Two targets for “therevolutionary force,” moral and material(xiii). Widespread confusion of people atthe present time (xix-xvii). Failure tounderstand the art of communication(xviii). For working within the system(xix-xxiii). On Vietnam (xxiv). “From thebeginning the weakness as well as thestrength of the democratic ideal hasbeen the people” (xxiv). “Inertia” is an“internal enemy” (xxvi).
The Purpose.
A book like
The Prince
,but for the Have-Nots (3). Fordemocratic “revolution” (3-4). Today’sradicals are politically insensitive (4-6). The literature of the Haves justifies thestatus quo (7-8). To allow revolution andcommunism to be treated as one is asuicidal situation for radicals (9). Thisbook is neither in a capitalist nor acommunist mode (9-10).
The Ideologyof Change.
Ideology is a problem forthe “open society” organizer, since itimplies a fixed “basic truth” (10-11).Accept the world as it is (12-13). Acceptthat life is “a battle” (14). Accept theexistence of contradictions, the “dualityof all phenomena” (17; 15-17).
ClassDistinctions: The Trinity.
The Haves,the Have-Nots, and the Have-a-Little,Want Mores” (18-20). Optimism; only the“low road to morality,” deriving frombasic survival interest, exists (21-23).
Of Means and Ends.
Epigraph byWhitehead on action (24). An argumentfor “elastic” moral standards (24-32). “Tome ethics is doing what is best for themost” (33). Cynicism about ethicalproclamations formulated as “rules” (34-47).
A Word about Words.
Political wordsare “stained” (48).
Power.
Power is theright word; the concept must beembraced (49-53).
Self-Interest.
Self-interest must be accepted (53-54).Observations on contemporary politics(54-59).
Compromise.
“[A] key andbeautiful word” (59).
Ego.
Theorganizer must have “complete self-confidence” (60-61).
Conflict.
“[T]heessential core of a free and open society”(61-62).
The Education of an Organizer.
Qualities of good organizers (63-71).Curiosity (72-73). Irreverence (73).Imagination (73-74). A sense of humor(74-75). “A bit of a blurred vision of abetter world” (75-76). “An organizedpersonality (76-78). A “political schizoid”(78-79). “A free and open mind, andpolitical relativity” (79-80).
Communication.
The essential art foran organizer (81). Others mustunderstand what you’re trying to getacross to them (82-91). “[P]eople haveto make their own decisions” (91; 91-92). There are areas you cannot touch (93-95). Relationships affect responses (95-97).
In the Beginning.
Your identity mustbe established before you start tooperate (98-104).
Policy after Power.
One cannot dwell on problems to come,even if one knows about them (104-08).
Rationalization.
The status quo is justified by people with rationalizations;these must not be treated as “the real
of 00

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