We CAN Change The World: The Real Meaning Of Everyday Life (New Democracy Books, 1991).
Stratman draws on his experiences as a parent in the Boston school
busing battle and later as Washington director of the National
PTA, interviews with British coal miners and striking American
meatpackers, and wide ranging research and historical analysis,
to show that fundamental social change is possible. The key to
changing the world he argues, lies in a different view of ordinary
people.
Capitalism and Communism are based on the idea that ordinary people
are merely passive - the victims or beneficiaries of the actions
of elites, in a history driven by economic development. We
CAN Change The World contends that, far from being
passive, most people in their everyday lives strive to create
relations based on equality and commitment to each other. This
everyday struggle, so natural we hardly notice, drives history
and makes change possible.
"Human nature supposedly reflects the historical world which shapes it. Yet in our own world of competition, greed, and conflict, ordinary people everywhere strive in countless small ways and against all odds to form humane, cooperative, and friendly relationships with their fellows. This obvious yet largely unacknowledged fact lies at the heart of David Stratman's comprehensive vision of true democratic revolution. His pioneering work is the best antidote I know to both the self-inflicted despair of the left and the elitist betrayals of democracy, East and West."
--David F. Noble, York University;
Author, Forces of Production
"A profound respect for other human beings animates this book. David Stratman reminds me that ordinary people care more about people than about things - that they are already trying to change the capitalist world. In We CAN Change The World, he invites us to join them.
--Barbara Garson, Author,
The Electronic Sweatshop
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