Electing Activism
“I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy.”—John Adams
As I followed the Activism track at the Talking Liberties Conference, I pondered a question that wasn’t asked: How does living in a country that is at war (still and yet again) affect our work as artists? The likely answer: quite a bit, because in government, crisis shapes monetary policy.
Historically, the reduction of government support for ITVS, NEA, NEH, CPB—in terms of both grants to individual artists and advancement grants to organizations—resulted from who was making the decisions. In my state, Alaska, the arts council gave single grants in the 1980s larger than its entire present-day budget. Like the free market monetary policy in 19th century England, which maintained that no “government charity” would be given in response to the Irish potato blight and ensuing famine, our country’s present-day “trickle down” free market policy has just as surely punished the poor (and artists) as occasional recipients of government wealth.
So we gathered in Philadelphia to speak to activism, but we didn’t speak to how our money is spent. Perhaps Lani Guinier, commenting in the opening plenary, laid out our challenge best. Her thesis was one that I heard people using throughout the remaining days of the conference: “Convert your grievance into a cause.” This opening statement caught many of us by surprise—including those of us who have honed our grievance message through fundraising and programming. It asked us to transform a problem from “me” into “we.”
Professor Guinier asked us to move from private mutterings to a public movement. I was reminded of what Gandhi said: We need to become our solution. If the problem is “them,” then let us become them. Some of us can even run for public office—hearing and collecting concerns and hopes, and shaping them, village by village, county by county, into a creative movement for the future of this nation.
In every one of these small towns or counties in which NAMAC members live, there is a public official who spends your money and passes laws affecting your life and work, yet may not hold your concerns, your welfare, your hopes, as her interest. How does your community rate as a place that values what you do and what you believe in?
I’m not talking Bush and Kerry and national office. In my hometown of Anchorage, progressive-minded people accepted that we lived in a conservative town; after all, mayors for the past fifteen years won office by being labeled “conservative” Republicans. But one young politician saw it differently. Mark Begich was a Democrat who ran for that mayor’s seat and won. His victory resulted in our city government looking at planning, transit, the environment, the arts, and education in new ways. He led by linking to voters who hadn’t been served in those fifteen years. One small result: My organization, which just one year before this new mayor was elected was facing eviction from a publicly-owned facility, now owns that same building, having purchased it from the city for one dollar. That’s the difference elections can make. We elected the guy who could sign the deal.
Remarkably, one of the people who then decided to run for office was a first-time office-seeker and Anchorage filmmaker, Pamela Jennings. She’s a known progressive and friend of the creative community—and she got elected! Pamela’s not alone. Nationally, there is a new effort under way through an organization based in Chicago called the Creative America Project, which is working on training artists to run for office and determine policy. Tom Tresser, the lead organizer of this group, believes that “creativity is a national value.” I recommend their website, creativeamerica.us, to anyone thinking of making a real impact on policy—moving from “grievance to cause.”
I’ll close with a comment from Nicholas J. Begich, Alaska’s Democratic Congressman in the early 1970s, and the father of the new mayor who helped us get our building. Another of his sons, Tom, gave me this quote. I think it speaks to our members’ challenge: “While office without philosophy is pointless, philosophy without office is futility.”
I submit that our grievance is a lack of office for the vital, necessary philosophy we live by. John Adams looked for the day his sons would study mathematics and philosophy. We still have war and politics. It’s time we become our government. Run for office.
JAY BRAUSE is co-director of Out North in Anchorage, and a citizen-artist in training
© 2005 National Alliance for Media Arts and Culture. All Rights Reserved.
