Sustaining Democracy: Localization, Globalization, and Feminist Praxis

Sustaining Democracy: Localization, Globalization, and

Feminist Praxis1

Nancy A. Naples2

Following contemporary discussions of environmental sustainability, I view sustainable democracy as an

approach that remains open to diversity, promotes well-being for all social actors, and advances social

justice. The notion of sustaining democracy that I adopt foregrounds everyday practical and participa-

tory strategies that are self-consciously tied to a vision of the future which will be more economically

equitable, peaceful, inclusive, and socially just. However, I argue, a political vision cannot be enacted

without an epistemological articulation that informs political practice. Feminist praxis contains, in its

epistemological formulation, a reflexive process by which lessons from past activist engagements are

incorporated into contemporary efforts, which, in turn, are further reflected upon in changing political

and cultural contexts. Feminist praxis is further deepened by incorporating epistemological insights from

feminist theories of intersectionality to inform its political methodology. I illustrate the possibilities of

intersectional feminist praxis for sustaining democratic practice with attention to five different dimen-

sions: strategies for inclusion, methods of empowerment, countering power imbalances, organizing

across differences, and processes of reflexivity.

KEY WORDS: feminist praxis; intersectionality; participatory democracy; sustainability.

Freedom from want—from hunger and homelessness and the denial of basic needs—is themost fundamental freedom, without which there can be no other freedoms. Ensuring this free-dom by building living democracies, strengthening civil society, and empowering people is theproject of democracy of our times. (Shiva 2005:89)

INTRODUCTION

Throughout my academic career, I have been interested in the ways inwhich participatory democratic practices are manifest in everyday politics. I am

1 My gratitude to members of the Eastern Sociological Society (ESS) for the honor of serving asPresident. This article is based on the Presidential talk given at the ESS meetings, March 24, 2013.My thanks to the University of Pittsburgh’s Department of Sociology for allowing me to present adraft of this article and for their valuable feedback. Special thanks to John Markoff, Jackie Smith,and Susan Ostrander for their inspired suggestions and for sharing their work with me. Thanksalso to Mary Bernstein, Chris Bose, Barbara Gurr, and Cathy Schlund-Vials for their importantcontributions to the article and for the amazingly quick turnaround.

2 Department of Sociology, University of Connecticut, Room 326, Unit 1068, 344 Mansfield Rd.,Storrs, CT 06269-2068; e-mail: [email protected].

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DOI: 10.1111/socf.12054

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© 2013 Eastern Sociological Society

not only interested in participatory forms of democratic practice because I havewitnessed that they can be individually transformative for participants and thatit helps promote a sense of community and belonging that is missing in otherforms of more individualized politics. I also believe that it is a necessary compo-nent for producing sustainable solutions to contemporary environmental, social,and economic challenges. Yet, I also recognize the challenges faced in instantiat-ing participatory practices that are inclusive of diverse social actors and effectivein contesting inequality of access and empowerment in order to advance socialjustice goals in different contexts. When I examine projects that successfullyinvolve social actors who have been traditionally left out of political discourseand decision making, insights from feminist praxis are often evident, if notexplicitly, in the attention to ensuring diversity of participation, developingstrategies for empowerment, negotiating power imbalances, organizing acrossdifferences, and incorporating processes of reflexivity to inform future action. Inthis article, I consider the value of intersectional feminist praxis for offeringimportant conceptual and practical strategies for sustainable democraticpractice.

Following contemporary discussions of environmental sustainability, I viewsustainable democracy as an approach that remains open to diversity, promoteswell-being for all social actors, and advances social justice (see, e.g., Harcourt1994; Salleh 2009; Shiva 2005). The notion of sustaining democracy that I adoptforegrounds everyday practical and participatory strategies that are self-con-sciously tied to a vision of the future which will be more economically equitable,peaceful, inclusive, and socially just. However, the vision for the future cannotbe enacted without an epistemological formulation of a methodology that willinform political practice. Sustaining democracy or any form of political praxis,requires an articulation or, at least, an awareness of the epistemology thatundergirds the political methodology.

My conceptualization of sustainable democracy differs from the definitionof democracy as a form of governance with rule of the entire people through for-mal political structures.3 This approach does not necessarily include a vision ofsocial justice that informs the decision-making process, nor does it requireshared commitment to empowerment or contesting inequality. While my workbuilds on the extensive analyses of participatory democracy prominent in politi-cal science and political sociology,4 I find that many of these discussions fail toengage with feminist insights into the way in which “relations of ruling” (Smith1987) structure who gets to participate and whose voices are privileged at differ-ent levels of decision making and collective action. For example, Erik OlinWright (2012) in his 2011 American Sociological Association PresidentialAddress, “Transforming Capitalism Through Real Utopias,” considers “equal

3 Merriam Webster Dictionary (2013) defines democracy as “a government in which the supremepower is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of repre-sentation usually involving periodically held free elections.”

4 See, e.g., Beierle and Cayford 2002; Fishkin 2009; Fung and Wright, 2003; Gaventa and McGree2010; Markoff 2012; Pateman 2012; Polletta 2002; Sirianni 2009.

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access to participation” as central to democracy as well as the requirement that“important domains of decisions that significantly affect the lives of many peo-ple are [not] excluded from collective decision-making” (p. 5). However, hisfocus on class dimensions of power without an intersectional framework limitshis vision of a real utopia beyond capitalism.

In a general sense, Wright’s (2012) project is similar to mine in that heconsiders equality, democracy, and sustainability as the “moral principles” or“standards with which to judge existing institutions and social structures” (p. 3).Yet, his emphasis on capitalism’s role in structuring and reproducing inequalitymisses the complex “matrix of domination” (Joseph 1981; Nash 2008) that fur-ther structures social life. In fact, early feminist standpoint epistemologies(which inform or dovetail with intersectional approaches) developed from theinattention within Marxist political economic analyses to the ways in which cap-italism intersected with or relied upon the dynamics of colonialism, gender andracialized inequalities, and other modes of oppression (Harding 1986; Hartsock1983; Joseph 1981; Mohanty 2005). My multidimensional approach to democ-racy and sustainability incorporates an intersectional lens through which to criti-cally reflect on what works in different sites with attention to systems ofinequality that inhibit and strategies that enhance deep democratic practice.

The larger project that motivates this article derives from the following pre-mises: (1) political projects operate with epistemological stances that shapeaction, whether conscious or not to the organizers; (2) when these epistemologiesremain rigid, namely, when they are not open to reformulation in light of chang-ing political, historical, and cultural context; OR when these activist epistemolo-gies are derailed by pressures driven by utilitarian impulses, delegitimized, orrejected there is less likelihood that knowledge generated from previous actionswill be incorporated into subsequent efforts; and (3) feminist praxis incorporatesa commitment to self-reflexivity that corrects for these tendencies. In otherwords, in its epistemological formulation, feminist praxis contains a process bywhich lessons from past activist engagements are incorporated into contempo-rary efforts, which, in turn, are further reflected upon in changing political andcultural contexts. In addition, feminist praxis, as a mode of knowledge produc-tion and democratic political practice, also includes four other dimensions thatoffer both a vision for the future and a method for potentially achieving thisvision. These dimensions relate to participatory democratic practices and includethe goals of inclusion, empowerment, challenging inequality, and organizingacross differences for social justice goals.

The approach I take in this article is further deepened by incorporatingepistemological insights from feminist theories of intersectionality to inform itspolitical methodology (see, e.g., Collins 1991; Crenshaw 1993; Naples 2009b).My meditation on sustaining democracy consists of three parts. I briefly definemy approach to intersectional feminist praxis and why I find it useful for sus-taining democratic practice. Then I consider models of intersectional feministpraxis as they are manifest in three different projects: localized democratic prac-tices, state–community collaborations, and democratic practices in transnational

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context. In each case, I discuss the dilemmas faced in efforts to create an inclu-sive and multidimensional approach to sustaining democracy. I illustrate thepossibilities of intersectional feminist praxis for sustaining democratic practicewith attention to five different dimensions: strategies for inclusion, methods ofempowerment, countering power imbalances, organizing across differences, andprocesses of reflexivity. I conclude that intersectional feminist praxis, as a politi-cal methodology, is uniquely positioned to contribute to sustaining “deepdemocracy” (Green 1999) across differences in identity, social and economicissues, levels of governance, geographic and other borders, and socialmovements.

SUSTAINABILITY, STANDPOINT EPISTEMOLOGIES, AND

INTERSECTIONAL FEMINIST PRAXIS

Many scholars and activists in the environmental movement emphasize theessential link between participatory democratic practice and environmental sus-tainability. For example, feminist environmental activist Vandana Shiva (2005),who has been developing a notion of “earth democracy,” explains that principlesof earth democracy include the need to defend “diversity in nature and culture”and an assertion that “[a]ll beings have a natural right to sustenance” (p. 9).Environmental sustainability requires constructing democratic governancestructures that can promote broader participation in solving the world’s complexenvironmental challenges. The argument here is that the more diverse the inputinto problem solving, the more creative and “robust” the solutions (Collins2012) and the greater the buy-in for solutions identified (Mansbridge 1999).

I find myself especially interested in addressing the social and politicalmechanics of effective democratic practice: How does it work? How do youcreate the grounds for inclusive and deep forms of democratic practice thatwould provide equal access and generate a sustainable social world? What arethe potential pitfalls that we face in localization and globalization of democraticpractice? And what is the role of social movements, community organizations,and the state in facilitating inclusive democratic practice? In this article, I exam-ine strategies developed by activists and activist scholars who are working inand through social justice projects and who take an intersectional feministapproach to organizing. The activist approaches and activist projects I highlightare explicit about their praxis. Furthermore, their organizing is informed byepistemologies of practice that are open to reflection and, therefore, to revisionin the context of ongoing deliberation and activism. This reflective practiceforms one of the most significant aspects of what I am calling intersectional fem-inist praxis.

The call for intersectional analyses were first heard from feminists of colorwho critiqued approaches that constructed women’s experiences without atten-tion to the ways that race, class, and sexuality shaped their experiences. Subse-quent work emphasized the structural dimensions of what Dorothy Smith

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(1987) calls the “relations of ruling” and Patricia Hill Collins (1991) terms “thematrix of domination” that contour different women’s experiences. I take a mul-tidimensional approach to intersectionality in considering models of intersec-tional feminist praxis (see also Anzald�ua 1987; Collins 1991; Hancock 2007;Sandoval 2000).

The first dimension I highlight relates to the epistemological formulationthat different standpoints are contoured by the intersection of diverse socialexperiences and produce different ways of knowing or different knowledgesabout social life. Standpoints are achieved in community, through collectiveconversations and dialogue among women in marginal social positions, andthrough political struggle (Collins 1991; Haraway 1988; Hartsock 1983). Femi-nist standpoint theorists like Nancy Hartsock (1999) and Sandra Harding (1986)linked their analysis to Marx’s historical materialism, insisting that “our workproduces both our material existence and our consciousness” (Hartsock1999:47). From the vantage point of intersectional feminist praxis, knowledgedevelops directly from lived experiences rather than abstract theorizing. Thisdimension speaks to the importance of diverse experiences and voices in enhanc-ing understanding of the dynamics of oppression and inequality. This intersec-tional analysis is evident in the following quote from the Combahee RiverCollective (1983:264):

The most general statement of our politics at the present time would be that we areactively committed to struggling against racial, sexual, heterosexual, and class oppression,and see as our particular task the development of integrated analysis and practice basedupon the fact that the major systems of oppression are interlocking. The synthesis of theseoppressions creates the conditions of our lives. As Black women we see Black feminism asthe logical political movement to combat the manifold and simultaneous oppressions thatall women of color face.

Of significance to intersectional feminist praxis, as captured in the Comba-hee River Collective’s statement, is the importance of reflection on experience inorder to transform it into knowledge that is then available for action. Haraway(1988), Hartsock (1983), and Collins (1991) emphasize that standpoints areachieved in community, through collective conversations and dialogue amongwomen in marginal social positions, and through political struggle. This processof transformation is facilitated by a second dimension of intersectional feministpraxis, empowerment for activism.

Empowerment for activism underscores the significance of community andthe availability of safe spaces for providing the context in which individuals cancritically reflect on their experiences and political strategies in dialogue with oth-ers. Taking inspiration from Paulo Freire’s (1970) analysis of “conscienti-zac�~ao,”5 many feminist activists and educators have developed strategies forempowerment that emphasize nonhierarchical and collective approaches.

5 Paulo Freire’s (1970) conceptualization of conscientization was first developed in the Latin Ameri-can context to describe the process by which people come to understand how their particular situa-tions are shaped by their culture, how they reflect on these new understandings, and act against thecircumstances that oppress them to create a more just social world.


Feminists in the field of Gender and Development (GAD) define empowermentas a “counterhegemonic” political process by which “subaltern” women wouldcome together to discuss their experiences and become aware of structural pro-cesses shaping their lives and that of their communities (Sharma 2008). With thisawareness, they would be mobilized to fight against the different modes ofoppression and transform power relationships in their homes, communities, andlarger society.

The third dimension of intersectional feminist praxis speaks to the signifi-cance of placing in dialogue situated knowledges generated in multiple sociallocations by diverse social actors for generating collaborative strategies foraction. My formulation of this third dimension recognizes the interrelationshipor intersections between the “actualities of everyday life” (drawing on DorothySmith’s [1987] conceptualization), the local context, as well as the social struc-tures or relations of ruling that are far from view. This third dimension thereforehighlights the interrelated processes of localization and globalization as well asthe diversity of sites and issues for social justice organizing.

The fourth dimension asserts that the knowledges generated through thesepractices are used to inform actions that promote social justice goals. In otherwords, the primary purpose of the collaborative process of deliberation andknowledge production is to identify strategies for social action designed toreduce inequality and promote social justice. Intersectional feminist praxisencourages opportunities for cross-movement, cross-issue, and cross-class and-race collaborations that are necessary to sustain social activism and democraticpractice over time.

The fifth dimension focuses on the process by which actions taken as a con-sequence of these deliberative and participatory practices are reflected upon toinform future actions. The process of reflexivity is a collaborative and iterativeone that also encourages assessment, critique, and revision of strategies forinclusion, empowerment, and organizing across differences.

Taken together, these five dimensions bring into focus the significance ofdiverse voices and experiences, opportunities for empowerment to enhancemeaningful participation, critical dialogue, coordinated action across differ-ences, and critical reflection. The implications of these five dimensions for identi-fying forms of intersectional feminist praxis are first, the need to assess theextent to which inclusive practices are utilized that broaden the base for partici-pation in decision making and action, especially as it relates to those decisionsthat most directly affect different social actors. The second implication for demo-cratic practice is the need to develop strategies for empowerment to furtherexpand meaningful political dialogue and activism. The third implication is theprovision of ongoing opportunities to link different analyses derived fromdiverse social locations and perspectives in order to generate coordinated actionplans. The fourth implication is the importance of identifying and implementingactions that are designed to promote social justice. And fifth, the significance ofcritical reflection on the political actions taken as well as, among other issues,such as “who is or is not deemed to be a legitimate knowledge producer, which

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spaces, institutions, and languages get excluded from practices of knowledgemaking, and with what results” (Nagar and Swarr, 2010:16; see also Bose 2011;Salime 2010) in order to reshape strategies for inclusion, empowerment, anddeliberation as needed for future actions.

In the next section, I illustrate the limits and possibilities of intersectionalfeminist praxis for sustaining democratic practice in this current political andeconomic context in three different configurations: localized community-basedpractices, collaboration with the state, and transnational sites of organizing.

LOCALIZATION, COMMUNITY, AND DEMOCRATIC PRACTICE

Since my concern is how we can practice democracy in a sustainable way, Ibecame interested in Shiva’s (2005) notion of “living democracies” that, as sheexplains, involves the “trend toward localization” (p. 88). Localization, she con-tends, “provides a test for justice. . . [and] sustainability.” Because local commu-nities that have control over their local economics and resources have the“ability to rebuild nature’s economy,” she argues, they can build toward “theirown sustainability” (p. 64).6 To illustrate her vision, Shiva describes the alterna-tive economic development strategy of Lijjat Papad. Lijjat Papad was started in1959 by a group of seven women in Gurgaum, Mumbia, to roll papads, alsoknown as poppadam, to sell for income. By 2005, the organization they createdwith a collectivist organizing strategy had 40,000 members. Their annual incomegrew from 6,196 rupees to 3 billion rupees. Lijjat Papad explains their success atbuilding a viable and sustainable collective economic project “where nobodypasses orders” and “all enjoy equal rights” as a consequence of their organiza-tional philosophy which emphasizes “common ownership, non-discrimination,voluntarism, autonomy and independence, ethical business and commitment toquality, not profits” (quoted in Shiva 2005:69). Lijjat Papad adds that their orga-nization is more than an economic model, but functions “like a family” and evenas “a place of worship” (p. 70).

I am struck by how much their philosophy resonated with the vision ofcommunity and social justice shared by the women community activists I inter-viewed in New York City and Philadelphia in the 1980s and early 1990s, manyof whom describe their work as a social mission. This suggests that the successof social justice projects should be understood as more than the specific practicesdeveloped by the participants. The question here is the extent to which enactingand sustaining democratic economic projects requires an emotional connectionor deeply felt commitment to the economic and political goals along with a senseof family or community that transcends the utilitarian goals of the project. How-ever, as feminist philosopher Iris Marion Young (1990:302) cautions, “the idealof community. . .denies the difference between subjects” and “relies on the same

6 Shiva (2005) explains that to reach national or international sites of decision making and gover-nance must be accomplished through “the principle of subsidiarity [where things are most effec-tively done at the level closest to where the impact is felt]” (p. 64).


desire for social wholeness and identification that underlies racism and ethnicchauvinism, on the one hand, and political sectarianism on the other.”

Aradhana Sharma (2008) describes a feminist-influenced and state-spon-sored development project in India that drew on a construction of communitywhich assumed homogeneity among the women in rural villages in India, whowere the target of the program. The project, Mahilia Samakhya (MS), wasestablished in 1988 to identify and train women in different villages to partici-pate in women’s collectives (mahila sanghas). Women were brought into the pro-ject through their friendship network. Through the collectives women wereencouraged to identify local problems and attempt to problem solve with theassistance of sahyoginis who served as facilitators and trainers. Sahyoginis werealso the primary liaisons between the collectives and the government and otherinstitutions.

Mahilia Samakhya is administrated by the Department of Education withconsultants from different nongovernmental organizations. The project differedfrom other state-sponsored projects in its critique of social hierarchies, and itscommitment to processes of accountability to the rural women, decentralization,and grassroots participatory planning. Despite the feminist praxis that informedthe project, the emphasis on the similarity of the women based on a presumptionof “a preconstituted community amenable to feminist collective empowerment”(p. 152) failed to account for differences among residents that, in turn, led to ten-sions among participants, between participants and other members of the vil-lage, and between the participants and program staff. As Sharma explains, theview of women’s collectives “as relatively easy aggregations of essentially similarindividuals. . . which privileges similarity over difference, ironically results in anassertion of differences and power hierarchies between women, in competingclaims. . ., and in the performance of ‘dangerous’ gendered acts that may subvertan emancipation- and equality-driven feminist vision of empowerment” (p. 153).

Feminist scholars and activists are well aware that the public realm is not“free of power relations” (Young 2000:382). Young’s principle of inclusionincorporates recognition of “structural differentiation,” not as an obstacle todeliberation but “as a political resource” (p. 387). Young proposes a model ofdemocracy that includes public debate in which situated knowledges from par-ticipants representing different social groups are sought and encouraged. These“differentiated representative practices” are viewed “as an important enactmentof political inclusion” (p. 123). Consistent with feminist standpoint epistemol-ogy, Young argues that individuals sharing a similar social field generate a socialperspective that can be further differentiated in relation to other social groupsthrough a deliberative process. It remains unclear how such spaces can effec-tively temper the inequalities that inevitably structure social relations.

In addressing this issue, Young (2000) argues that “social group differenceis a resource in democratic communication” as “it allows us to notice structuralrelations of dominance and subordination among groups that raise importantissues of justice for individuals” (p. 102). A strength of Young’s systematicapproach is that it does temper the risk of inclusive practices that

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indiscriminately provide open access for individuals or groups that desire inclu-sion without a commitment to democratic practice. In other words, “politicalcooperation” involves a commitment on the part of those working together“through means of peaceful and rule-bound decision-making” in order “to solveproblems justly” (p. 110).

Trying to solve problems justly may sometimes mean that some people’s perceived inter-ests are not served, especially when issues involve structural relations of privilege. Evenwhen the most just solutions to political problems do not entail promoting some interestsmore than others, fairness usually involves co-ordinating diverse goods and interest ratherthan achieving a common good. (p. 110)

Those incorporated into the process are expected to share the commitment todeliberation that is open to diverse participants and viewpoints.

However, intersectional feminist praxis cautions that “intentionality” (Juris2008) must be accompanied by strategies for empowerment to broaden meaning-ful participation. This raises other dilemmas including how to find a balancebetween education for empowerment and the power dynamics that often under-gird the relationship between “tutors” and those who are targets of empower-ment projects. As Francesca Polletta (2002) describes it, “When participatorydemocrats are joined primarily by relations of tutelage, the potential for conflictlies in the question of how much tutelage is necessary for people to gain accessto, and act on, their interests” (p. 78; see also Sharma 2008). As noted above,feminist analysis of empowerment projects also reveal the depoliticizing effect ofa government-sponsored “will to empower” (Cruikshank 1995). Calls forempowerment, once associated primarily with radical left and feminist move-ments, have been adopted by development and other government agencies inways that often support neoliberal and anti-welfare goals (Sharma 2008).

Despite the inequalities and exclusions that accompany varying construc-tions of community and community-based empowerment projects, Judith Green(1999:11) points to the significance of community for “ordinary citizens.” Yet,building and sustaining a sense of community need not take the form of inter-personal emotional connections, nor be defined around an assumption of same-ness. It can also be constructed through a personally felt connection to an“imagined community” (Andersen, 1983) of those committed to promoting thewell-being or sustainability of a geographic community or to specific economicor political goals. In this sense, democratic strategies designed to promote andsustain feelings of community, broadly defined, remain significant for sustainingboth community and democracy. In fact, it is this commitment that may enableparticipants to trust that they will be heard and to tolerate disagreements.

Furthermore, as Susan Ostrander (2013) demonstrates in her long-term eth-nographic study of Somerville, Massachusetts, the community context that pro-motes and supports participation plays a key role in sustaining democraticpractices over time. Ostrander’s approach attends to the complexity of commu-nity as a social, geographic, and political space that shapes the extent to whichsocial actors feel that they can make a difference by participating. This raises the


bigger question about what the role of the state should be in promoting and sus-taining deep democracy. In her qualitative study of Somerville, Ostrander(2012:1) concludes that “when associations exercise their agency to choose whenand how to work with government (and when not to), this preserves associa-tional independence while at the same time allowing for beneficial forms ofstate-associational engagement.” This presupposes that potential actors arealready incorporated into existing voluntary associations and are recognized bythe state. The later point is especially relevant for intersectional feminist praxisin that many people exist in liminal spaces, without formal citizenship or withformal citizenship but without the ability to access citizenship rights.

Young people are typically marginalized from political participation due tonarrow definitions of what counts as political and cultural assumptions abouttheir lack of interest in politics and media constructions of youth as eitherprimarily concerned with self-gratification or uninterested in politics (Pruitt2013). In an innovative study of young people’s contributions to peace buildingpublished in the SUNY Praxis: Theory in Action Series that I edit, Lesley J. Pru-itt analyzes music making as a form of political dialogue. She discusses howorganizers used music to address racism and sexual violence in Australia and eth-noreligious divisions in Northern Ireland. In Australia, the organizers adoptedhip-hop, rapping, and break dancing as forms of protest. With a reflexive under-standing of their historical and cultural emergence in New York City in the1970s and their significance beyond the originating context, they explored thevalue of these forms of dialogue and collective action. Activists in both countriesunderstood music as a resource for empowering youth to engage in peace-build-ing efforts. As Pruitt notes,

In addition to its capacity to inspire hope and aid people’s realization that things can bedifferent, music can serve a significant function in inspiring a spirit of community and dia-logue in public life. . . . Making music gives us the tools to register hope, to take risks inrelating to others, to cooperate across various differences, cultures, places and styles, andto find truly novel ways of relating in and with the world. (p. 22)

Pruitt (2013) also analyzes the gendered norms and practices among youthwith girls defined primarily as fans and boys as the makers of music. These com-munity-based projects challenged these gendered divisions by promoting girl-centered hip-hop, contesting misogyny in lyrics and performance, and “gender-ing the jam” (p. 141). Yet, gendered and heteronormative assumptions contin-ued to shape participation in the programs and interactions among participants.Racism against Aboriginal and Maori youth within the Australian projects wasalso evident. As Pruitt asserts: “Building sustainable positive peace with youngpeople will require constant reflection and an awareness of processes of inclusionand exclusion to avoid merely reproducing dominant cultural norms that oper-ate in a hierarchical way to exclude particular ideas and identities” (p. 141).

The success of these projects is linked to their understanding of the impor-tant role that music plays in the lives of young people and in providing spaces inwhich youth were empowered to express their goals, desires, and visions for the

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future. They also offered opportunities for the youth to participate in peace-building efforts that extended beyond the life of the project. Because the youthpeace-building projects were autonomous from the state, organizers did not haveto negotiate some of the contradictions inherent in state-sponsored approachesto empowerment.

THE CONTRADICTIONS OF THE STATE IN PROMOTING

DEMOCRATIC PRACTICE

Poor women, women of color, indigenous women, and others who havebeen the most marginalized or regulated by social and economic policies areespecially cognizant of the limits and contradictions of the state for empower-ment and expansion of democratic participation (see, e.g., Naples 1998). A pow-erful, albeit short-lived, government experiment in empowering local residentsto address community problems is found in the Economic Opportunity Act(EOA), a key legislative initiative passed during the War on Poverty, which wassigned into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964. Along with other ini-tiatives, the EOA established Community Action Programs (CAPS) that wouldbe “developed and conducted with the maximum feasible participation of resi-dents of the areas and members of the groups” served. As CAPs began to chal-lenge the inequalities and inadequacies of city agencies to serve poorcommunities, mayors successfully petitioned Washington to curtail and then todismantle the community action component of the legislation (Naples 1998).

The War on Poverty’s investment in empowerment of the poor could beviewed as a success in that it legitimated the activism of those who were alreadyengaged actively within their communities and mobilized others through theCAPs. However, many state actors were unprepared for the challenges theseempowered activists posed to the state. Sharma (2008) describes a similar “para-dox” in a multisited study of a feminist-initiated project in rural India that wassuccessfully incorporated into the state. Her reflexive methodology allowed herto analyze the complex intermingling of depoliticization and “subaltern politicalactivism” (p. xxi). While the “tutelage” in state-sponsored empowerment pro-grams had the effect of constructing subaltern women “as proper citizens,” thewomen in the villages incorporated into the state develop expectations of thestate that can lead to protests against insensitive and ineffective state officialsand programs. As Sharma explains, “[t]he alternative envisionings of gover-nance, development, personhood, belonging, and a just society put forth by sub-altern women’s politics and protest are, perhaps, unintended and empoweringfallouts of government programs” (p. 198).

In her analysis of efforts to enhance women’s participation in Indian state-supported development projects, Ranjita Mohanty (2006) concludes that theseprojects failed “to secure the meaningful political participation of women” due,in part, to “the control of men of the recruitment of women. . .; and stereotypesof women’s public roles that go unchallenged by a putatively neutral state”


(pp. 81–82; see also Sharma 2008). In their edited collection, Participatory Citi-zenship: Identity, Exclusion, Inclusion, Ranjita Mohanty and Rahesh Tandon(2006), present case studies that further demonstrate the challenges of imple-menting participatory democratic projects in India that underscore the need tocontextualize analysis of participatory democratic processes in different culturaland national contexts. As Andrea Cornwall and Anne Marie Goetz (2005)affirm, “creating new democratic spaces is not, in itself, enough to erase embed-ded cultural dispositions and styles of politics that are often as inimical towomen’s participation as those in the formal political arena” (p. 795). However,the reflexivity of intersectional feminist praxis can provide a political and con-ceptual tool for identifying and negotiating these and other obstacles to the par-ticipation of women and other marginalized groups.

An intersectional angle of vision requires us to consider multiple sites forempowerment and enablement (to borrow Saskia Sassen’s [2008] distinction) toensure that the radical and transformative goals remain at the center. In order toaccomplish this, state-sponsored projects should be linked closely with grass-roots efforts to ensure accountability and the incorporation of ongoing outreachand training for inclusive democratic practice. These projects also need to beattentive to the cultural and political context–sharing social relations (Currier2012; Mohanty 2006).

As feminist projects like MS become incorporated into the state bureau-cracy, intersectional feminist praxis calls for vigilance regarding the contradic-tions of the state for empowerment, social justice, and progressive social change.Andrea Cornwall and Vera Coelho (2007) explore sites of citizen engagementwith the state via “new democratic spaces” that operate at the interstices of stateand society. They emphasize several of the dimensions I offer as significant forintersectional feminist praxis; namely, that efforts to broaden participation needto include attention to facilitating access and promoting empowerment for par-ticipants, ensuring representation of “marginalized groups,” and developingaction steps derived from participatory process. The lessons they derive from thecase studies included in their edited collection on Spaces for Change? demon-strate the need for “subaltern counterpublics” (Fraser 1992a:124) that serve assites for those from self-defined subaltern groups to deliberate and constructclaims that can be brought forward to the state or other democratic spaces.

“Subaltern counterpublics” are sites where groups who are typically mar-ginalized or disenfranchised from a presumed “universal public sphere” canrepresent themselves through and develop both a self-conscious articulation ofthe structural dynamics that contribute to their marginalization and a plan foraction that contests an oppressive and hegemonic “rule by the majority ideol-ogy.” In the “subaltern counterpublics,” marginal groups can develop “coun-terdiscourses” to contest hegemonic ideologies that deny, dismiss, or demonizetheir “identities, interests, and needs” (Fraser 1992b:67). In this way, subalterncounterpublics contribute to a process of inclusion that expands the public dis-course beyond “bourgeoisie” who dominate the “universal” public spaces (see,e.g., Ferree et al. 2002). However, for subaltern or marginalized groups to be

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drawn into these alternatives spaces, feminists and other radical and progres-sive activists call for empowerment projects to attract and train those whohave had little opportunity to participate in deliberative and participatorypolitical projects. These efforts come with their own set of contradictions asPoletta (2002) and Cruikshank (1995) point out. In the next section I highlightone successful approach to empowerment that is strengthened by reflexivepractice.

EMPOWERMENT AND REFLEXIVE DEMOCRATIC PRACTICE

Feminist organizations have generated a variety of empowerment projectsdesigned to enhance marginalized groups’ political consciousness and participa-tion in social justice activism. These projects have been more or less successfuldepending on the way in which they incorporate sensitivity to the cultural con-text and the concerns and situated knowledge of participants. In 1998, the femi-nist organization Kayan developed a new model for training women forleadership roles to enhance Arab women’s political participation in Israel. Thename Kayan, Arabic for “being or existing,” was chosen to capture the organiz-ers’ view “that social change can be achieved when women are empowered toexert influence and make decisions about their own lives as well as society as awhole” (Kayan 2013). Their feminist goal is to

invest in the development of grassroots leadership to catalyze social change grounded inthe elimination of gender disparity. Kayan values pragmatism in the democratization ofthe public sphere, fosters genuine agency among Arab women and brings their influencedirectly to bear upon the realization of their rights.

This project grew out of a decade of informal coalition work involving 180 Arabwomen’s groups and 3,000 women from 50 Israeli villages and towns (Deeb2010:12). As Kayan director Rula Deeb (2010) notes:

The model changed and solidified, through repeated evaluations and testing of the pro-gram’s goals in general, and through the program’s ongoing feedback specifically withgroups of women involved. . . . The program model changed in light of these findings, withprogressively deeper understanding about the continuity required when working with lead-ership development projects with communities of women and sustainable communityactivism. (p. 112)

Kayan activists recognize the material and other resources required by poorwomen to facilitate their empowerment and participation. Legal services areamong the many supports they provide. Not surprisingly, the majority of thelegal work they do is in the area of family law. However, they work on manyfronts in response to the needs of women in different communities. In additionto promoting the empowerment of low-income women, providing legal aid, andsecuring access to transportation and health care, they mounted campaignsagainst domestic violence and sexual harassment, and for living wages and gayrights. The diversity of issues they address is primarily a response to their


reflective practice. They maintain self-evaluation and ongoing revision of organi-zational goals to keep their projects vibrant and relevant to Arab women inIsrael. While the organization focuses specifically on the needs of Arab women,Kayan works closely with other feminist organizations that include collaborativeprojects developed by Jewish and Arab women.

Kayan illustrates intersectional feminist praxis through their efforts tobroaden the base of participation and maximize the opportunities for empower-ment and dialogue across differences, enabling women’s participation throughadvocacy around transportation and access to other material resources, collabo-ration across differences, and ongoing reflection on their work. While inequali-ties in access, education, training, and visibility remain, the reflexive democraticpractice they adopt serves as a way of identifying and correcting the limitationsthey encounter in implementing their vision. These and other lessons from local-ized feminist practices are also relevant at different levels of deliberation, deci-sion making, and political action; yet other challenges arise in transnational sitesof activism.

TRANSNATIONAL FEMINIST PRAXIS AND DEMOCRATIC PRACTICE

Transnational social justice movements offer significant sites for envisioning“real utopias” (Wright 2012) and enacting inclusive democratic practice. In fact,intersectional feminist praxis recognizes that local struggles are shaped by struc-tures that intersect with regional, national, and transnational processes andinstitutions (see, e.g., Naples and Desai 2002). In a new edited collection onBorder Politics, Globalization and Social Movements, coeditor Jennifer BickmanMendez and I (Mendez and Naples forthcoming) further highlight the challengesof organizing across borders to achieve effective social change. Yvonne Braunand Michael Dreiling’s (forthcoming) chapter on the movement against majordam projects in Lesotho details the work of a network of local and internationalmovement organizations that are advocating against the corporate takeover ofland and the corresponding environmental destruction. Braun and Dreilingfound that the alliances between the local activists in Lesotho and the resource-rich transnational environmental groups in the Global North were shaped bypower differentials privileging the interpretations of transnational allies. As aconsequence, political strategies and analyses of the local groups were overshad-owed by the transnational activists. While local activists were concerned withcorruption, the plight of displaced persons, and environmental justice, transna-tional activists focused on environmental preservation. The transnational activ-ist perspective led to the development of different political strategies thateffectively undermined the local efforts to achieve environmental and socialjustice. In this case, the transnational activists’ failure to acknowledge and reflecton the power differentials and the differences in assessment and movement goals,limited the collaborative potential of their “global assemblages” (Collier andOng 2004; see also Keck and Sikkink 1998).

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Elsewhere Braun (2005) describes the structural and interpersonal violenceagainst women that accompanies the dam projects. Her analysis supports Shi-va’s (2013:n.p.) argument that “[a]n economics of deregulation of commerce, ofprivatisation and commodification of seeds and food, land and water, womenand children unleashed by economic liberalisation, degrades social values, deep-ens patriarchy and intensifies violence against women.” Feminist intersectionalpraxis makes visible the links between the structural violence of capitalism, the“devaluation of women’s work and work done in subsistence economies of theSouth” (n.p.), and rape and other forms of violence against women (see alsoEnloe 1990). Unfortunately, transnational organizing against violence againstwomen is haunted by the same dynamics noted by Braun and Dreiling. ObiomaNnaemeka (2004), founder and president of the Association of African WomenScholars, observes that “[a]s they join transnational feminist forces, Third Worldwomen face a double-pronged challenge—the fight against patriarchal national-isms on the one hand and the resistance against colonialist and imperialist femi-nism on the other hand” (p. 12).

This dilemma is evident in the tensions between local activists, and humanrights and international development organizations analyzed by Elora Chowdh-ury (2011) in Transnationalism Reversed: Women Organizing Against GenderedViolence in Bangladesh, another book published in the Praxis Series. Anti-acidmobilization began as a local initiative. Local activists’ successful public aware-ness campaigns drew the attention of Western feminists and internationaldonors. Unfortunately, the transnational networks that developed to addressthe problem “transformed [the local group’s] radical vision of structural changeand women’s communal empowerment into a neoliberal one of incrementalchange and individual transformation” (p. 27). Here we see an illustration of thecontradiction of social movement success in the context of structural inequalities(see, e.g., Thayer 2009).

What is notable here is the significance of critical reflection that has beenpart of transnational feminist praxis to identify and counter these tendencies.Feminists in Latin America and Africa have been especially vocal in challenginginequalities within transnational feminist movements (see, e.g., Alvarez et al.2003; Nnaemeka 2004; Oyewumi 2004). The critical reflection on how powerfunctions to silence women in the South or to marginalize poor women in allregions from those with the resources to participate in transnational organizinghas raised consciousness about the needs to develop more creative and effectivestrategies for uncovering and resisting the inequalities within feminist move-ments (see, e.g., Hewitt and Karides 2011).

One promising development in social justice activism is the growth of coali-tions bringing together diverse social movements. Progressive activists includingthose active in women’s groups and antipoverty, religious, labor, environmental,and disabilities rights organizations are joining together to challenge the legiti-macy of the inequalities that accompany global economic and political restruc-turing (see, e.g., Bystydzienski and Schacht 2001; Desai 2005; Hawkesworth2006). In their book in the Praxis Series,Making Globalization Work for Women,


Valentine Moghadam, Suzanne Franzway, and Mary Margaret Fonow (2011)describe how insights from intersectional feminist praxis can enhance the pro-gressive possibilities of transnational labor organizing. For example, union femi-nists not only challenge the sexual politics within unions and work to mobilizewomen, but also they have built local and global networks to broaden participa-tion in union politics and link their efforts with feminist movements moregenerally.

In their introductory chapter, Fonow, Franzway and Moghadam (2011)discuss how feminist union activists also model coalition politics within thetransnational worker rights movements as feminists join with queer activists “torevitalize and expand the boundaries of the labor movement by pushing unionsto consider new forms of organizing, new types of workers and workplaces, andnew agendas” (p. 18). They conclude that solidarity and networks linking tradeunions with lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) movements challenge“the heteronormative sexual politics of labor movements” and can help reframeworkers’ interests to address the economic and social rights of LGBT workers(p. 303). Feminist union activists have been central in building the analyses andcollaborations to broaden union activism to reflect these concerns.

Given the extensive experiences that feminists have in organizing transna-tionally, they have contributed significantly to the political vision and intersec-tional democratic praxis within various social justice movements, mostprominently the World Social Forum (Smith et al. 2008). Contributions of femi-nist praxis include providing models that emphasize “decentralized, respectfuldialogue and cooperation that helped inform other social movements seeking tobridge national and other differences” (pp. 18–19); and “the holistic approachthat recognizes intersections of multiple oppressions, and critical and inclusivemethods of organizing” (Hewitt and Karides 2011:92). Feminists also promoteantihierarchal organizational practices that would silence diverse voices.Furthermore, feminist activists working through the World Social Forum, forexample, provide analyses of the ways in which “gender subordination” is anessential component of neoliberal globalization (p. 86). However, Lyndi Hewittand Marina Karides (2011) also note that, in practice, “the economic analysis ofneoliberalism or globalization, although critical, overshadows social based cri-tiques” (p. 93). Here we see another opportunity for reflexive practice to helpidentify ways to counter the unidimensional analyses that are dominant in manysocial justice mobilizations.

A group that has been especially prominent in bringing feminist praxis tothe transnational social justice movement is Development Alternatives forWomen for a New Era (DAWN). DAWN is a network of feminists from theGlobal South which came together in 1984 to consider approaches to develop-ment that foreground women’s issues and the sustainability of their environ-ments (see, e.g., Sen & Grown 1987) (Naples 2009a). During the 2004 WorldSocial Forum and subsequent World Social Forums, DAWN (2004)co-organized Feminist Dialogues in which they posed several questions that arecentral to inclusive modes of feminist organizing and coalition building,

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including “How are we filling in the gaps in local and global organizing interms of representation (who speaks for whom, [and] how local issues are dis-torted/[or] misrepresented. . .by international, regional and national net-works)?” and “How are we addressing issues of power, accountability andtransparency, and structural inequities both within the North and the Southand across the North–South, in relation to deciding agendas, division of work,resource sharing and access?” By reflecting on these questions, the FeministDialogues encourages activists to address power imbalances in their organizingpractices. The extent to which activists can correct for structural inequities willvary by region and by issue; however, engaging in this process of reflexivity willfacilitate transparency and accountability that could further movement goals inother ways.

The Feminist Dialogues were designed to provide spaces for communica-tion and translation of movement strategies for women from diverse back-grounds and different political formations. Tensions did surface among thewomen participating in the Feminist Dialogues based on region, political ideolo-gies, generation, sexual identity, and feminist identity (Hewitt 2011). The manydifferences that divide social movement participants, even those who share acommitment to social justice goals, pose a fundamental challenge to the processof moving from deliberation and dialogue to action. Differences are also shapedby whether activists represent local, national, or transnational sites of feministorganizing (see also Eisenstein 2009; Naples and Desai 2002). There are also anumber of issues that historically divide women’s movement activists includingthose related to abortion rights, sexual rights, displacement, and nationalisms(Benhabib and Resnik 2009; Moghadam 1994; Petchesky and Judd 2001).Through the process of deliberation some of these differences can be negotiatedby constructing political frames that serve the purpose of linking different issuesunder a broad conceptualization.

Framing strategies can help to provide a collective understanding of theunderlying causes of inequality and oppression as well as strategies for action. Ina study of frames that were salient at the 2007 Feminist Dialogues meetings andthe 2007 World Social Forum in Nairobi, Kenya, and the 2004 World SocialForum in Mumbai, India, Hewitt (2011) identified three different frames thatserved different purposes for the activists. One of the frames that successfullyunited women across differences was the “anti-fundamentalist frame” (Hewitt2011:80). As Hewitt argues, “anti-fundamentalism” has the advantage of linkinganti-patriarchy, anti-militarization, anti-religious fundamentalism, and anti-neo-liberal economic policies under a wide frame to broadly define “the problem.”The disadvantage to this framing is that it does not inform what actions need tobe taken in order to counter it (p. 80). She explains that anti-fundamentalismfocuses on critique, rather than action.

In contrast, the human rights frame has been more useful in shaping activistinterventions. Citing Rosalind Petchesky (2008), Hewitt (2011) points out thatan intersectional understanding of human rights is necessary to keep in focus the“fervent belief that all rights are interconnected” and that gender, sexual, racial,


cultural, and regional differences remain salient within human rights framing(p. 85). This effort is central to intersectional feminist praxis in human rightsorganizing. Yet, feminists and other activists also point out that there are manywomen’s and indigenous peoples concerns that do not fit neatly within the neo-liberal human rights framework, including access to education, environmentalissues, and sovereignty. For example, as Jacqui Alexander and Chandra Mohan-ty (1996) explain, “there is no language or conceptual framework to imagine ter-ritorial sovereignty as a feminist demand—or to theorize decolonization as afundamental aspect of feminist struggle” (pp. xxxiv–xxxv). Yet the discourse onhuman rights has proven effective in many contexts. For example, SusannaWing (2002) documents how the women in the Sahelian State of Mali used theinternational discourse on women’s rights to increase women’s activism onbehalf of their constitutional rights and their political representation.

Hewitt (2011) identifies a third frame that also ties directly into the argu-ment I offer in this article; namely, that insights from intersectional feministpraxis include attention to the application and dissemination of processesdesigned to achieve “egalitarian, horizontal, and intersectional modes of work-ing and thinking” (p. 88). While not unique to feminist organizing, the approachincludes self-conscious attempts to articulate and disseminate these practices toother social justice movements (p. 88). To move from dialogue to action requiresbuilding trust and solidarity through collective dialogue and deliberation. Fram-ing is a necessary but insufficient factor in moving from deliberation to action.Some frames provide the context for action, while others serve other purposes.Context matters for understanding what functions different frames serve and tohow they can facilitate solidarity, collective vision, or action.

Although I have centered women, gender, and feminist movement goals inthe cases I highlighted, it is important to point out that intersectional feministpraxis remains open to insights drawn from different social movements. Forexample, lessons from anti-racist, anti-colonial, and anti-capitalist struggles andcampaigns for LBGT and disabilities rights have been incorporated into inter-sectional feminist praxis and have also informed activism within these move-ments (see, e.g., Crass 2013; Hall 2011; Moghadam, Franzway, and Fonow2011; Narayan and Harding 2000; Wappett 2002). For example, in her study ofLGBT organizing in Namibia and South Africa, Ashley Currier (2012) illus-trates the relevance of queer standpoints for intersectional feminist praxis (seealso Cant�u 2009). She makes visible the difficult choices activists had to make toconstruct collective identities that did not expose their constituents to harass-ment and violence in a hostile homophobic context. These choices sometimescontributed to exclusivity and homogenization of identities within movementorganizations—goals that seem to run counter to the intersectional feministpraxis I explore in this article. However, intersectionality was practiced throughconstructions of “race, gender, class, sexuality, and antilesbian-violence survivorstatus” as “signifiers of disadvantage against which [the organization] worked toempower black lesbians to become women who could overcome oppression”(p. 59). Currier’s rich historical and ethnographic comparative account cautions

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against positing intersectional feminist praxis as a decontextualized andabstracted political methodology, and, in and of itself, a solution to the con-tradictions and divisions that plague social justice organizing. I view it as anepistemologically grounded political resource that can be put to use with varyingdegrees of success depending on different historical, political, interpersonal, andcommunity contexts.

CONCLUSION

Whether conscious or not of the debt owed to feminist praxis, contempo-rary mobilizations like the localized participatory democratic projects, commu-nity-state collaborations for empowerment, and transnational social justicemovements I discuss are drawing from the lessons of earlier feminist organizingstrategies that call for anti-hierarchical and inclusive democratic practices. Theinfusion of an ethic of care into contemporary organizing is especially significantgiven the history of masculinist organizing in the New Left and unionmovements (Fonow 2003). Movements that fail to incorporate lessons ofintersectional feminist praxis are destined to encounter lost opportunities forcross-movement, cross-issue, and cross-class and -race collaborations that arenecessary to sustain social activism and democratic practice over time. Forexample, in a case study of Occupy Wall Street (OWS), Jackie Smith (2012)reports that OWS organizers explicitly rejected lessons learned from previoussocial movements which, in turn, inhibited “the long-range work of movement-building” (p. 369).

In many of the cases discussed in this article, we see the blurring of linesbetween localization and globalization, between social movements and the state,between participatory democracy and service. Most people participating in theseefforts are not doing so as a commitment to participatory democracy per se.Instead, they are motivated by specific concerns or injustices that they want toaddress. While it is important to articulate and institutionalize models of partici-patory democracy that will promote inclusive forms of democratic practice, thecases discussed also highlight the importance of the visions of social justice orsocial needs that motivate participants and the communities that sustain them.In other words, “deep democracy” is not an end in itself, but a means to a vari-ety of goals. Some of these goals will be short term (like the election of a presi-dent); others are lifelong commitments (such as the transformation of economicsystems and the end to poverty).

Many obstacles abound in sustaining a form of deep democracy that recog-nizes the interconnections and intersections of our everyday lives, political andeconomic structures, and the environment we share. In this article, I illustratethe possibilities of intersectional feminist praxis for sustaining democratic prac-tice with attention to five different dimensions: strategies for inclusion, methodsof empowerment, countering power imbalances, organizing across differences,and processes of reflexivity. Reflexivity is a collaborative and iterative process


that involves assessment, critique, and revision of strategies for inclusion,empowerment, and organizing across differences.

Many scholars concerned with implementation of deliberative and partici-patory democracy recognize the need for outreach and training that will broadenthe base for inclusive democratic practice and provide new participants with thebackground and skills needed to be successful in their participatory roles. How-ever, empowerment projects can be implemented without the radical impulsethat generated enthusiasm from feminists and other radical and left activists inthe 1960s (Naples 2002). As Sharma’s (2008) study demonstrates, the neoliberalappropriation of empowerment has subverted “collective politics” and the “per-sonal as political” (p. 17). Neoliberal approaches turn empowerment into anindividual project defined around building self-esteem and encouraging self-help.Intersectional feminist praxis reveals the limits of these approaches but alsoacknowledges the contradictions inherent in the “will to empower” (Cruikshank1995). Empowerment is simultaneously a process of “individual transforma-tion,” and “collective mobilization for change” (Sharma 2008:27–28). Successfulempowerment strategies are open to critical reflection and revision with the goalof enhancing effective activism for social justice goals. These efforts are localizedaccomplishments which require attention to the dynamics of community andbuilding solidarity across differences.

Successful grassroots projects like Lijjat Papad “illustrate the power ofcommunity to build change, and how the very act of struggle creates—or re-cre-ates—communities that had been absent or fractured” (Danaher et al.2007:250–251). Yet, as emphasized earlier, we also need to be reflexive of thelimits to community-based efforts. As Polletta (2002) cautions, close ties built upamong movement or organizational participants can lead to exclusionary behav-iors that serve to divide those who share a history of engagement from newcom-ers or others who don’t share the same social attributes or views on politicalstrategies or organizational goals. She asks “whether friendships in social move-ments have indeed supplied trust, intimacy, and complex equality for somemembers of the group at the expense of others” (p. 154). This dilemma is alsoevident in some Occupy Movement activism where those who have the time todevote to daily activism may contribute to the creation of relationships thatexclude those who have less time and resources to engage in regular face-to-faceorganizing efforts (Smith 2012). In contrast, Smith reports that the reflexivityadopted by the United States Social Forum and World Social Forum thatincludes “serious attention to process” has helped to mitigate against “the prob-lems close friendships can create” (Jackie Smith, personal communication, June17, 2013).

Following her analysis of radical feminist praxis in the late 1960s and early1970s that relied heavily on friendship and eschewed hierarchical structures or aformal division of labor, Polletta (2002) concludes that “[t]he solution seems tobe to institute rules and relationships” (p. 175). In addition, I argue, attentionmust be paid to the relations of power that contour the grounds by which capi-talism is reproduced as well as the multiple ways in which it can be resisted

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beyond economic strategies. In much of my own work, I have been exploringstrategies that can “create the grounds for collective action or solidarity in thecontext of rampant ‘asymmetries and inequalities’” (Grewal and Kaplan 2000,quoted in Naples 2009a:12). Intersectional feminist praxis includes a process ofreflexivity for revealing the dilemmas, contradictions, and limits of participatorydemocratic practices and social movement politics in order to counteract theseinequities. Reflexivity involves deliberation among participations with theexpress goal of broadening feedback and reflection to include diverse experiencesand analyses. The feminist construct of “subaltern counterpublics” as sites forthe development of “counterdiscourses” is relevant in this context in that it pro-vides spaces that expand opportunities for those who have been marginalizedfrom public discourse participate in identifying social needs and addressing solu-tions that go beyond traditional or hegemonic approaches. It also involvesempowerment processes that enhance the analytic and political skills ofparticipants.

My multidimensional approach to democracy and sustainability emphasizesdeveloping effective strategies for inclusivity, empowerment, organizing acrossdifferences, generating coordinated action plans designed to promote social jus-tice, and critical reflection. While institutionalization of deep democratic prac-tice is an essential step toward creating the grounds to build toward asustainable future, it requires an intersectional approach that attends simulta-neously to individual empowerment, provision of material support for participa-tion, community building, state advocacy, and cross-border and cross-issuecoalitions, all of which need to be supported by social movement activism. Inter-sectional feminist praxis includes attention to how these efforts need to be imple-mented with an ongoing process of reflexivity. In fact, I can think of no otherapproach to democratic practice that includes a mechanism for accountabilityand revision of strategies for inclusion, empowerment, organizing across differ-ences, and orientation to social justice action (see also Naples 2002). In this way,I argue, intersectional feminist praxis, as a political methodology, is uniquelypositioned to contribute to sustaining deep democracy across differences inidentity, social and economic issues, levels of governance, geographic and otherborders, and social movements.

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