Leah Hunt-Hendrix and Astra Taylor at Harvard Book Store

Harvard Book Store and Boston Review welcome LEAH HUNT-HENDRIX—co-founder of Solidaire and Way to Win—and ASTRA TAYLOR—American Book Award-winning author of The People's Platform—for a discussion of their new book Solidarity: The Past, Present, and Future of a World-Changing Idea. They will be joined in conversation by AZIZ RANA—professor of Law at Boston College Law School and author of The Two Faces of American Freedom.

About Solidarity

Solidarity is often invoked, but it is rarely analyzed and poorly understood. Here, two leading activists and thinkers survey the past, present, and future of the concept across borders of nation, identity, and class to ask: how can we build solidarity in an era of staggering inequality, polarization, violence, and ecological catastrophe? Offering a lively and lucid history of the idea—from Ancient Rome through the first European and American socialists and labor organizers, to twenty-first century social movements like Occupy Wall Street and Black Lives Matter—Hunt-Hendrix and Taylor trace the philosophical debates and political struggles that have shaped the modern world.

Looking forward, they argue that a clear understanding of how solidarity is built and sustained, and an awareness of how it has been suppressed, is essential to warding off the many crises of our present: right-wing backlash, irreversible climate damage, widespread alienation, loneliness, and despair. Hunt-Hendrix and Taylor insist that solidarity is both a principle and a practice, one that must be cultivated and institutionalized, so that care for the common good becomes the central aim of politics and social life.

Praise for Solidarity

“The great turning point of my life was the Reagan-era end of the idea that America was a group project. It was replaced with the notion that we were nothing more than individuals and the results included melting poles and shorter, harder lives for so many. Reversing those trends will require a recovery of solidarity as both an ideal and a practice. This wonderful book helps show the way.” —Bill McKibben, author of The Flag, the Cross, and the Station Wagon: A Graying American Looks Back at his Suburban Boyhood and Wonders What the Hell Happened

“For our age of austerity, debt, and inequality, Astra Taylor and Leah Hunt-Hendrix brilliantly retrieve solidarity and explore its radical potential. Connecting equals across difference, in states and at the global scale, solidarity emphasizes interdependent obligation against grinding hierarchy, including charitable and philanthropic noblesse oblige. This extraordinary book moves from the history of the concept to the present moment and proposes exactly the collective renovation that our political situation desperately requires.” —Samuel Moyn, author of Not Enough: Human Rights in an Unequal World

“While the labor movement taught us to sing, ‘Solidarity Forever,’ working people who struggle to make ends meet have rightly asked, ‘Solidarity for what?’ This book's vision of ‘transformative solidarity’ is an answer to that question informed by history, aware of the forces we're up against, and engaged with some of the most encouraging movement-building of our time. It’s a gift for all of us who want to build a world where everyone can thrive.” —William J. Barber, II, President of Repairers of the Breach and Founding Director of Yale's Center for Public Theology and Public Policy

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