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The H-PAD Steering Committee has issued the following statement on Bolivia (November 17, 2019):

Historians for Peace and Democracy unequivocally condemns the unconstitutional removal of Bolivian President Evo Morales from office on November 10. The coup has directly empowered the Bolivian right, which has a terrifying record of racism, misogyny, and violence. Unsurprisingly, it has received vocal support from the Trump administration. We recognize that the political situation in Bolivia is very complex and that progressive Bolivians are internally divided, both about the policies of the Morales government and about what should happen next. However, this complexity should not obscure the fact that Morales’s ouster was a coup and that it has greatly strengthened the most reactionary forces in Bolivian society. We condemn the U.S. support for the coup and call upon all parties to work for a peaceful, just, and constitutional resolution to the crisis.

See more…

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H-PAD Plans for the January 3-6 AHA Convention in New York

At the American Historical Association’s annual meeting, January 3-6 in New York City, H-PAD and the Radical History Review, which is an AHA affiliate organization, have organized a set of eleven sessions stretching from Friday afternoon into Sunday, all in the same room. Click here for a flyer listing the topics and their times, and here for full details on each session with names of the participants.

Two working groups of H-PAD, dealing with Immigration and Palestine respectively, have secured enough signatures to put resolution proposals on the agenda of the AHA Business Meeting, 5:15 – 6:30 Friday, Jan. 4. Click here for the wording of these resolutions.

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Dear friends and supporters,

As 2019 advances, Historians for Peace and Democracy is moving forward on many fronts, and we need your support.

First, thanks to Barbara Epstein, H-PAD has built a relationship with the Democratic Socialists of America — they now get first dibs when our “Broadsides for the Trump Era” are published. Co-Chair Margaret Power’s “Puerto Rico: A U.S. Colony in the Caribbean” is up on DSA’s website, reaching their 60,000 members directly, and more are coming.

Second, led by Andor Skotnes and in alliance with Radical History Review, we are organizing a full slate of panels for the American Historical Association annual meeting in New York in January 2020, including:

• • Asia Pivots: Past and Present
  • The Koch Network & Democracy: Disrupting Today’s Academic Capture
  • A Right to Bear Arms? The Contested Role of History in Contemporary Debates on the Second Amendment
  • 50th Anniversary: Cambodia and the Campuses, Lessons Learned and Unlearned
  • Historians and the Current Crisis: Strategy Meeting
  • Organizing Students to Vote: History and Best Practices
  • Historians Respond to Extreme Right Governments Around the World
  • Revolutionary Positions: Global Legacies of Gender and Sexuality in the Cuban Revolution
  • Roundtable of /RHR/ Issue Editors on the State of Radical History

For a more complete description of each panel, click here.

Third, Jeri Fogel organized an excellent panel for the June 28-30 Left Forum in New York City under the title “Historians and the Current Crisis: Old/New Ideas for Organizing Against Wealth and Power.”

Finally, H-PAD hosted a National Strategy Meeting on May 28, 2019, at Columbia University, with close to fifty historian-activists attending from many different campaigns and backgrounds, to debate the role of historians in the current crisis and to build networks of solidarity and common action. For a report on the meeting and list of attendees, click here.

Organizing the above costs money: $250 for Left Forum; $1,000 or more in room and logistics at AHA; food, rooms, and some partial travel subsidies for the May 28 meeting (at least $3,000).  And we plan to start producing a series of short videos featuring historians directly answering political questions like “What is Fascism?” and “Why is the U.S. Not a True Democracy?,” which require a professional videographer.

Will you help out, with $15, $25, or more, to support all of the above?  You can use the donation button on the right.  And if you send in $35 or more, we’ll send you a neat H-PAD button, with HPAD’s logo image!

In solidarity, Van Gosse, Co-Chair

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Other H-PAD activities

Check out Jim O’Brien’s biweekly selection of insightful news and journal articles in the H-PAD blog section.

Podcasts of our H-PAD panel “Two More Years of Trump: What Is to Be Done?” at the 2019 American Historical Association are now available.

In the fall of 2018, H-PAD sent out seven “Voting Rights Alerts” (see blog posts) to help prepare for the midterm elections on November 6, and advocate for students’ right to vote.

H-PAD is developing a Public History Campaign, finding ways to agitate for peace and justice with useful, accessible, accurate materials.  Our Public History campaign has three components:

• Investing in a much larger social media presence, including webinars, videos, and podcasts;
• Producing many more “Broadsides for the Trump Era” and distributing them widely, via web ads;
• Building partnerships with progressive and left organizations and publications to distribute our public, political, and popular history.

You can contribute to the Public History Campaign by signing up as an H-PAD Campus Contact or Community Contact, becoming a liaison for possible events and speakers.  Please sign up here.  You can also help by making a financial contribution.  To build our “Public History” campaign, we need to pay for professional help in creating new media, advertising space on the web, and the distribution of our materials to everyone who needs them.

U.S. Foreign Policy History & Resource Guide

This open resource website, sponsored by H-PAD and the Peace History Society, continues to build a solid foundation for critical thinking on U.S. foreign policy.  Written for students and the general public, the latest essay is “U.S. Participation in World War I.”  For a description, see this H-PAD blog.