Michael Harrington

Edward Michael Harrington ( born February 24, 1928 in St. Louis, Missouri, † July 31, 1989 ) was an American democratic socialist, author, political activist, professor of political science and broadcaster. His book The Other America was a basis of the Johnson administration in the fight against poverty ( War on Poverty ) in the USA.

Life

He attended Saint Louis University High School, the College of the Holy Cross, the University of Chicago (MA in English Literature ) and the Yale Law School. As a young man he became interested in politics and Catholicism. Consequently he joined the Catholic Worker Movement of Dorothy Day. He loved debates on culture and politics, and was educated in a Jesuit convent made ​​him a great orator and friend of debates. From 1951 to 1953, Harrington editor of The Catholic Worker. Disillusioned by religion - although he retained a certain affection for the Catholic faith - he pleaded ultimately to atheism.

Harrington is a socialist

The alienation from the faith was accompanied by a growing interest in Marxism. Harrington left the The Catholic Worker and was a member of the Group of Independent Socialist League (Independent Socialist League ), a small organization that leaned towards the former Trotskyist Max Shachtman. Harrington and Shachtman believed that socialism with the promise of a just and truly democratic society to create, can not be realized in an authoritarian communist system. Both of them were extremely critical of the bureaucratic collectivism of the countries of Eastern Europe and in other parts of the world.

Harrington was a member of the Socialist Party of America (SPA), as these merged with the organization Shachtman. Harrington advocated to continue working in the Democratic Party rather than own socialist candidate set up.

Activities

During this period Harrington wrote his book Poverty in the United States. This exerted a strong influence on the politics of John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson against poverty. Harrington was a noted author and writer of political columns. He debated not only with conservatives, but it also clashed with young radicals of the New Left. He participated in the SDS Conference ( Students for a Democratic Society) in 1960 in Michigan. This memorandum sat in his opinion in the final version is not strong enough from existing communism from. Arthur M. Schlesinger called him so the "only responsible radical " in America. His reputation made ​​him one of the main opponents of President Nixon.

In the early 1970s, Shachtman became a liberal hawks against communism. Shachtman and the leadership of the SPA supported the Vietnam War and brought about a renaming of the party in Social Democrats USA. This led to the dissolution of the SPA. Under protest Harrington led a number of young socialists and activists in the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee. Another small group got together for peace activist David McReynolds, who founded the Socialist Party of the USA.

In the early 1980s, the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee joined with the New American Movement, an organization of former members of the New Left. They formed the group Democratic Socialists of America. This organization, in turn, is currently the most important American member of the Socialist International dar. In the Socialist International socialist and social democratic parties are organized as the Swedish Social Democratic Party, the Social Democratic Party of Germany ( SPD), Nicaraguan FSLN and the British Labour Party. Harrington was the Democratic Socialists from 1982 to 1989 as Chairman before.

Academic career

Harrington was appointed in 1972 as professor of political science at Queens College in New York. He died in 1989 from cancer. During his lifetime he was the most famous American socialist.

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