In this episode we speak to Kamau Franklin. Kamau is the founder of Community Movement Builders a grassroots organization dedicated to creating sustainable Black communities through organizing and cooperative development. Kamau has been a dedicated community organizer for over twenty-five years, first in New York City and now based in the south.  He has worked on various issues including community cop-watch programs, freedom school programs for youth, electoral and policy campaigns, large-scale community gardens, and programmatic alternatives to incarceration. He is also the co-host of the Renegade Culture podcast. 

Franklin has written many essays and articles for various publications. Notably his essay “An Ivory Tower Assassination of Malcolm X” appears in the book,  A Lie of Reinvention: Correcting Manning Marable’s Malcolm X. He also wrote an essay entitled “A New Southern Strategy” which was published in the book Jackson Rising: The Struggle for Economic Democracy and Black Self-Determination in Jackson, Ms.

Franklin was the first campaign manager for Chokwe Lumumba’s successful mayoral election, in Jackson, Ms and practiced law in New York for many years.

We talk to Kamau about the work of Community Movement Builders, the theoretical basis for their model and various examples of their organizing practice and vision for development.

If you are interested in supporting the work at Community Movement Builders please check out their website Communitymovementbuilders.org.

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