The Green New Deal’s (GND) growing popularity presents a potential sea-change for popular movements in the US. A growing audience for a public and sustainable reorganization of everyday life offers plenty of oxygen for left-wing ideas. But because who gets what, why and how will be decisive either publicly or behind closed doors, understanding how these questions are being answered today is essential if we want to fight for meaningful change. Eliot Tretter’s Shadows of a Sunbelt City: The Environment, Racism and the Knowledge Economy in Austin is a model for future research into these problems in Texas. Bearing the reputation of an environmentally conscious, liberal stronghold, Austin today is not only among the least affordable cities in the US but also among the most racially segregated. The novel leaders and political blocs that Tretter uncovers behind Austin’s knowledge economy are ones that movements in Austin and elsewhere will have to identify and disarm, to win the GND and challenge the ruling class. {…}
Keeping Austin Cleared
