| Especially since the "new social movements" of the 1960s and 1970s, the complexities of group status difference and oppression have posed major challenges to social movements aimed at justice and equality. This paper explores the potential for social movement organizations to approach race, class, gender, and sexuality in ways that resist essentialized identities and expose and challenge the dynamics of power by which structural oppression operates. Focusing on the Washington Peace Center--a social movement organization in the District of Columbia--as a case study, I utilize qualitative, oral history interviews to illuminate the process of group difference interrogation and anti-oppression activism over time. I find that justice-seeking social movements-- through an attention to standpoint, openness to the claims of other social movements, and proper consideration of the connection between local, national, and global issues--are capable of meaningful engagement across group difference that undermines complex and interrelated oppressions. |
