Show Me What Democracy Looks Like: Articulating political possibility in Durham, North Carolina

Abstract

As in most U.S. cities, municipal voter turnout in Durham, North Carolina is stratified by race and income level. Local politicians win elections by catering to the predominately white and middle-class bloc categorized as "likely voters." In the face of this self-reinforcing, systematic political bias, a Durham coalition is attempting to construct a progressive voting bloc led by working-class people of color. Among other challenges, Justice For All members are consistently faced with the assumption that they are investing in the impossible. Drawing on participant observation conducted in the months preceding Durham’s 2017 municipal election, this thesis asks: 1) how does the construction of “reasonable,” and “radical” in political discourse work to privilege certain political formations while undermining others? 2) How do social actors articulate the legitimacy of political formations and strategies that have yet to be constructed? I analyze Justice For All’s formal communications strategies as well as countless conversations held in a variety of public and private spaces. I argue that, in each of these spaces, group members engage in a form of discursive theorizing that works to overcome the limits of hegemonic discourse and speak (as well as organize) new political formations into existence.