WWU professor urges new social justice tactics

Michael Karlberg wants social justice activists to look beyond protest.

Karlberg is a Communication Studies professor at Western Washington University. He recently released a new book titled Rethinking Social Justice. The work challenges the standard approach to social change.

Most social justice work focuses on conflict. Activists disrupt power systems to change the status quo. Karlberg argues that this strategy is not enough. He says leaders must also build new systems to replace the old ones.

Karlberg co-authored the book with Derik Smith from Claremont McKenna College. The pair has worked together for ten years as thought partners. They argue that contentious politics is reaching a point of diminishing returns. Karlberg notes that the largest protests in human history occurred in the last 20 years. He says these events have produced less effect over time.

The authors point to a paradox in non-violent protest. They argue these methods can reinforce the culture of contest that creates the problems. This does not mean activists should stop protesting. It means they need to broaden their strategy.

Karlberg teaches a class on non-violent social change at Western. The new book builds on his earlier work from more than 20 years ago. That previous book was titled Beyond the Culture of Contest. He and Smith now focus on constructive agency.

The Zapatista movement in Chiapas, Mexico, serves as a primary example. The group started as a violent response to state oppression. They quickly realized they could not out-violence the state. They shifted focus to building the world they wanted to live in within the Mexican state.

Karlberg also cites the Creative Commons movement. This publishing license allows creators to keep ownership while letting others share their work. Legal activists developed it after failing in court to change copyright laws. Most scholars do not view this as a radical social justice step. Karlberg says it was more successful than contentious strategies and continues to grow.

The authors published Rethinking Social Justice with the nonprofit press Open Book Publishers. They used a Creative Commons license for the book. This ensures the text is available to as many people as possible. In the first three months, the book was downloaded more than 3,300 times. Those downloads came from over 70 countries.

Karlberg believes social justice leaders must think more audaciously. He argues that public discourse limits imagination when it ignores constructive opportunities. He wants the field to expand its view of how social justice looks and how it is achieved.