‘I’m hoping people get inspired’: what can we learn from the godfather of community organizing?

American Agitators is a rousing new documentary about Fred Ross Sr, who spent more than 50 years fighting against divisive and destructive forces in the US“Community organizing” is a phrase that’s taken on an almost elastic quality in this fraught political moment. When it isn’t being wielded by right-leaning ideologues to slight grassroots politics (see the 2008 US presidential and 2025 New York City mayoral elections), it’s being embraced by progressives who believe that hopscotching among maj...