From the Editors
In Fall 2010 we relaunched BR: kept the mission, but transformed the look. We were pleased with the change, but we needed to hear from you. Judging by the results of the first full year, we did the right thing. Subscription income and individual donations both grew more than 60 percent in 2011. The final piece of our relaunch—a newly designed and configured Web site—is still in progress. Watch for it this spring.
We’re thrilled with the growth, which confirms two core beliefs: that with a big change in design, we could reach people we hadn’t reached before, and that if we could reach them, we could attract them. Our confidence grows from the conviction that there is a large market for serious analysis and argument about public issues, without tiresome and distracting partisan screeches—a market for a publication that redeems your sensibilities without insulting your intelligence.
In this issue the analysis and argument focus on black politics. The forum is anchored by an essay from University of Chicago professor Michael Dawson. Dawson argues that black political movements in the United States have, at their best, offered particularly compelling visions of justice. He laments their decline. But beyond lament, he makes a case for rebuilding them, both to address persistent racial disadvantage and as part of a larger effort to achieve economic justice for all.
In a wide-ranging debate, respondents wonder whether black solidarity is still possible in the face of deep economic and social divisions among black Americans. They wonder, too, whether organizations built around black leaders and activists are necessary in a broader movement to create a more just society. The debate does not settle these important issues, but it succeeds in making a more serious argument possible.
We also have a pair of articles that consider two very different but equally interesting democratic experiments—in Spain and Brazil. Gianpaolo Baiocchi and Ernesto Ganuza write on the Spanish indignados, a mass movement whose participants come together directly as equal citizens—not as members of interest or identity groups, or through representatives—to debate the merits of policy. The indignados, Baiocchi and Ganuza say, present a profound challenge to conventional democratic politics. And Carlos Fraenkel explores the implications for democracy, justice, and civic engagement of a Brazilian law that requires every teenager to take courses in philosophy.
Finally, Claude Fischer reviews Steven Pinker’s The Better Angels of Our Nature, a book crediting reason as a key factor in a long trend toward decreasing human violence. We are not sure whether Pinker is right on the details. But we share his conviction that reason matters.
