The View From The Top

Civil society is messy, disorganized, chaotic, spontaneous and unpredictable. This is our own personal experience of life lived in the real world, with people who work for a living and struggle to make a better life for themselves and their children. This was life as experienced in Taksim Square, a tangle of plazas, streets and […]

Poetry and Social Change

On August 16, 1819, 60,000 peaceful pro-democracy and anti-poverty protestors met in what is now St. Peters Square in Manchester, England. The square was filled with banners on which were written the words, ‘Reform’, ‘Universal Suffrage’, ‘Equal Representation’ and even ‘Love’. Magistrates panicked and ordered the cavalry to charge the field, which they did with sabres […]