Amid political repression and a deepening affordability crisis, what can communities do to fight against austerity policies and for city budgets that give communities the resources they need to address their needs? Cities have to do more than elect progressive mayors and work towards specific policies or campaigns. They must work to democratize our democracy, and build durable civic infrastructures for co-governing power.

This Jubilee School session centers budget justice, participatory democratic experiments, and people’s budget campaigns around the country to outline key challenges, tensions, and possibilities. Taking inspiration from the Global South/ Global Majority, as well as two decades of research and activism in local struggles for collective governance in the US, we will discuss lessons and tools from participatory democratic experiments– such as, but not limited to, participatory budgeting and mutual aid networks. What might meaningful versions actually look like in an age of austerity? When and how can they be used to make a real impact?

Please join Debt Collective and author Celina Su for a conversation about her book, Budget Justice: On building grassroots politics and solidarities.

Celina Su’s academic, pedagogical, and creative work focuses on everyday struggles for collective governance, centering economic democracy and racial justice. As an engaged scholar-activist, Celina has published four books on the politics of social policy and civil society, including her latest, Budget Justice: On Building Grassroots Politics and Solidarities, as well as a book of poetry, three poetry chapbooks, and pieces in the Boston Review, New York Times Magazine, n+1, New Republic, Harper’s, and elsewhere. She is the inaugural Marilyn J. Gittell Chair in Urban Studies and a Professor of Political Science at the City University of New York.