Makani Themba’s Making Policy/Making Change is truly a book for the current political period. Instead of lamenting the seeming apathy and disillusionment of the public, Making Policy/Making Change highlights the many successes local community activists have had in affecting public policy. Grassroots public policy campaigns have successfully taken on issues such as alcohol and tobacco billboards and liquor stores in low-income communities, low wages, workers’ rights for public employees, the privatization of city services, the accountability of corporations for environmental damage, and bringing youth into the policy-setting process.

Making Policy/Making Change is also quite timely as it comes at a time of renewed activism as characterized by the World Trade Organization demonstrations in Seattle and Washington and the demonstrations at the Republican and Democratic National Conventions in Philadelphia and Los Angeles respectively. In a political context in which time-worn strategies have netted limited success, the question of how to turn the energy reflected in these demonstrations into a strategy for change is a critical one.

Making Policy/Making Change identifies one approach: impacting policy on the local level. A strength of Makani’s work is that she does not deal with this strategy as a theoretical concept, but gives specific examples of instances in which it has been successful. Makani discusses these examples in such detail that activists looking to replicate them have, in effect, been given a blueprint for action. The book is written in a very user-friendly style. I found it to be very readable and think that it can be useful to professional activists, grassroots community people who are interested in making change in their communities, and youth activists. Using case studies and practical, how-to instruction, Making Policy/Making Change is a resource on how a community group can construct a policy initiative, work with the community and the media, and get it adopted while overcoming obstacles that are sure to be encountered.

As a community activist who has worked on public policy campaigns challenging privatization efforts in Philadelphia, I have witnessed the organizing potential of a campaign that reflects the aspirations of the community, the community empowerment that comes from a campaign successfully run, and the inaction that can result from the illusion that the passage of legislation means it is no longer necessary to struggle. Public policy campaigns are most useful as part of an overall strategy for change that challenges existing power relations. The task remains for activists to translate isolated successes into a long range vision for social change and a social change agenda.

Reviewed by Bahiya Cabral. Bahiya is on the staff of the American Friends Service Committee. She is a program associate for the AFSC’s project supporting the United Nations Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance.

1999. 176 pages. $28.
Published by Chardon Press
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