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Joshua Bloom

Associate Professor of Sociology, University of Pittsburgh-Pittsburgh Campus
Chapter Member: Central Pennsylvania SSN
Areas of Expertise:

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About Joshua

Bloom is interested in the dynamics of insurgent practice and social transformation. His studies of social movements, race, and labor, have been published in American Sociological Review and other venues. He is principal author of Black against Empire: the History and Politics of the Black Panther Party (University of California Press, special edition 2016), which won the American Book Award, and co-editor of Working for Justice: the LA Model of Organizing and Advocacy (Cornell University Press, 2010).

Contributions | No Jargon Podcast | In the News | Publications

Contributions

Why Repressing Anti-Racist Protests Constitutes Defense of White Supremacy

Commentary,

In the News

Interviewed in "Black Against Empire: The History and Politics of the Black Panther Party," (with Waldo E. Martin Jr. ) Harpers Magazine, March 15, 2013.

Publications

"The Dynamics of Opportunity and Insurgent Practice: How Black Anti-Colonialists Compelled Truman To Advocate Civil Rights" American Sociological Review (2015).

Revisits the forging ground of opportunity theory. Discusses why did President Harry S. Truman, initially an apologist for the slow pace of racial reform in 1945–46, suddenly become an avid advocate of civil rights?

Working for Justice (edited with Ruth Milkman and Victor Narro). (Cornell University Press, 2010).

Makes the case for a distinctive "L.A. Model" of union and worker center organizing. Networks linking advocates in worker centers and labor unions facilitate mutual learning and synergy and have generated a shared repertoire of economic justice strategies.

Black Against EmpireThe History and Politics of the Black Panther Party, With a New Preface (with Waldo E. Martin Jr. ). (University of California Press, 2016).

Features a new preface by the authors that places the Party in a contemporary political landscape, especially as it relates to Black Lives Matter and other struggles to fight police brutality against black communities.