How does social change happen? It requires an identified problem, an
impassioned and committed group, a catalyst, and a plan. In this
deeply researched consideration of seventy-seven stores and
establishments, Kimberley Kinder argues that activists also need
autonomous space for organizing, and that these spaces are made, not
found. She explores the remarkably enduring presence of radical
bookstores in America and how they provide infrastructure for
organizing—gathering places, retail offerings that draw new people
into what she calls “counterspaces.”
Kinder focuses on
brick-and-mortar venues where owners approach their businesses
primarily as social movement tools. These may be bookstores,
infoshops, libraries, knowledge cafes, community centers, publishing
collectives, thrift stores, or art installations. They are run by
activist-entrepreneurs who create centers for organizing and selling
books to pay the rent. These spaces allow radical and contentious
ideas to be explored and percolate through to actual social
movements, and serve as crucibles for activists to challenge
capitalism, imperialism, white privilege, patriarchy, and homophobia.
They also exist within a central paradox: participating in the
marketplace creates tensions, contradictions, and shortfalls.
Activist retail does not end capitalism; collective ownership does
not enable a retreat from civic requirements like zoning; and
donations, no matter how generous, do not offset the enormous power
of corporations and governments.
In this timely and
relevant book, Kinder presents a necessary, novel, and apt analysis
of the role these retail spaces play in radical organizing, one that
demonstrates how such durable hubs manage to persist, often for
decades, between the spikes of public protest.