Policy Review Document for Black Civil Rights Organizations
A request from Dr. J. Philip Thompson of MIT for critique, recommendations, and contributions to a policy review he is crafting, which aims to identify commonalities and differences in policy positions amongst Black organizations and to stimulate conversations that may develop into a unified agenda as we move into the 2016 election year.
Dear Friends:
I am helping to create a policy review document for black civil rights/advocacy organizations. For every topic area, I would like to create a short analytical narrative that discusses commonalities and differences among different civil rights organizations, gaps or omissions of important topics, and important critiques of different positions. The purpose is to stimulate conversations among the various organizations leading to agreements on policy so that black organizations are more unified leading to the 2016 electoral season and beyond.
If you would like to recommend documents on the topics listed in the attached document, or if you care to offer an overview or critique, please forward these to us. I included a short analytical overview I did for one of the topics, “full employment,” as an example.
Last, there are many issues on which the major black organizations have said little. International trade, immigration, tax reform, pha crisis, are among them. Areas of real disagreement, e.g., environment. The future economy/advanced manufacturing is virtually absent in policy platforms of black organizations (the Urban League comes closest to this). This is a bit surprising given the emphasis being put on this issue by the Obama Administration. Obama’s 2016 budget proposal contains $5 billion, $1 billion more than for public housing, just for new partnerships and startups in advanced manufacturing. If you would like to advocate for additional topics, please feel free.
Thanks,
Phil Thompson
Dept. of Urban Studies and Planning
MIT
J. Phillip Thompson [jt71@mit.edu]; J Thompson [jphilipthompson@gmail.com]
Please email responses to J. Phillip Thompson and Obiamaka Ude at obiamaka@mit.edu.