Our democracy is broken.
Though we are the oldest self-proclaimed democracy we lack the basics of real self-government: access to the polls for many citizens, accountability to the voters from politicians, competition among candidates to discern the people’s will, and real options for those who feel their voices aren’t being heard.
 
This is all fixable – if we are willing to acknowledge what is true, learn from others, and make real change. I stand with those who describe our country as “an evolving experiment in democracy.”
 
Nor do we have to give up being a capitalist economy – but, we can make changes that will enable our democracy to be more representative and our capitalism to serve the workers as well as the corporations.
 
Democracy and capitalism have worked effectively in other countries – most especially in Norway, as reported by Ann Jones in the latest issue of The Nation.
 
Norway has a commitment to both equality and democracy believing that “you can’t have one without the other.”  It is a parliamentary democracy where power flows from the top down; though “Norway celebrates society whereas in the United States we celebrate the individual.” (The Nation)
 
In Norway capitalism serves the people.  Negotiations between trade unions and the Confederation of Norwegian Enterprise determine the wages and working conditions of most capitalist enterprises so that income disparity is minimized.

As a white, middle class woman I have become increasingly aware of my “white privilege” – and I am developing a growing understanding that racism and white privilege are deep and insidious forces within our institutional structures.  I am just beginning my journey to discover the truths about these divisive forces.

I would like to share with you a bit of my past week's experience as I struggle to integrate what I learned into my life and my work – about the oppression that we all face.

Last week I attended a 6-day training in community organizing, facilitated by PICO, a national, faith based network of individuals and organizations that work in their communities, through their houses of worship; and, I plan to volunteer with my local PICO organization to address racism, privilege and mass incarceration - a new campaign here in Philadelphia. 

There were 100 folks at this training -- about 25% clergy, 80% people of color -- mostly Latinos and black folks.  These are people who are at the bottom of the pyramid -- organizing for grocery stores that they can walk to, schools, sidewalks to schools, health services, for alternatives to juvenile detention, against police brutality/racism, and mass incarceration -- and much more.  On Thursday, the woman sitting next to me, a lovely woman with 4 children, received a phone call from her neighbor that her house had again been burglarized, by neighborhood youth needing drug money – and this was not an unusual occurrence where she lived.