The issue is survival

We are in for a long hard time in the U.S. and the world as a whole. The divisions between people have grown too deep. The concentration of power in individuals and institutions that care little about the common good, pursuing their own interests at its expense, is too great. The buildup of problems either unaddressed or insufficiently addressed has mounted to an overwhelming extent. The ascendancy of Trump and Musk has intensified the situation, but the trends were going the wrong way for a long time before.

It is enough to make people throw up their hands in despair, wondering what they can do, or retreating entirely into personal life. But ultimately, there is little choice in that. For the issue is coming down to survival, of us as humans, of the natural world as a whole. The challenges facing us require collective action

There is plenty of bad news crowding our minds nowadays. Readers of this site are already well aware, so I don’t need to delve into details. What is needed is to set some directions, to look at how in the long term we dig ourselves out of this hole. Yes, we need to react to immediate events and put up resistance where we can. But we also need to go deeper, to the roots of our multifaceted ecological, social, economic and political challenges coming together as the polycrisis, and conceive how to address it from those roots.

If we understand the issue is survival, then we have a place to start. It is the place where we live, where we can build communities focused on human solidarity. Some of these will be hyperlocal, others at the level of towns and cities, or rural watersheds. Some will be in subnational units of government, such as states and provinces. Some will span bioregions. As I often write here, the challenge is to build institutions centered on the common good, revitalizing existing ones such as local and state governments, and building new ones such as public banks, worker coops, social housing, circular economies, local food networks, community energy installations and public broadband.

Joining for social housing in Seattle

I want to relate a story from my own home turf about one of the most basic survival issues – shelter – that illustrates some vital lessons in this regard. Seattle in recent years has experienced dramatic increases in housing costs, driven by the tech boom and real estate speculators. That has given the city the third highest number of homeless in the U.S., right after New York and Los Angeles. I cannot walk out in my neighborhood without seeing the evidence, people living in tents and RVs. This in a metro area that is home to some of the richest people in the world.

Though Seattle has a number of nonprofit housing developers, a group came together as House Our Neighbors to create social housing under city ownership, which ensures it remains in public hands and affordable. They were inspired by successful social housing models in Vienna, Austria and elsewhere. Drawing a wide range of support from labor unions, social justice and environmental advocates, progressive businesses, civic groups and political leaders, the group in February 2023 passed an initiative to create a city social housing developer with 57% of the vote.

But since initiatives can only cover one topic, it could not include enduring funding, only start-up money. So House Our Neighbors and its coalition partners moved to a second initiative to create a funding source. Washington’s arcane legal setup does not allow a progressive income tax, but there is a way to create a payroll tax that gets around that. House Our Neighbors designed an initiative that taxes excess corporate compensation, defined as over $1 million annually, at 5 cents on the dollar. It says something about wealth in Seattle that this is sufficient to raise around $50 million a year. That is enough to develop 2,000 housing units over 10 years.

Under immense public pressure, the City Council placed the initiative on this year’s February ballot as Proposition 1A. The off-year election already placed it at a disadvantage. But the Council was not done playing games. It placed a second option, Proposition 1B, on the ballot. It proposed to fund social housing out of an existing tax, also based on the payroll model. It would be funded at only $10 million per year out of funds already dedicated to affordable housing.

The two also varied in that 1A would allow a broader income range, in tune with the Vienna model in which social housing serves middle-income as well as lower-income people. That drew opposition from some low-income housing advocates. But an argument in favor is that the broader range exerts a control on rental rates across the income spectrum.

In the background were local behemoths Amazon and Microsoft, which would pay much of the new tax. Their Chamber of Commerce minions pushed for 1B. They supported the campaign to pass it. But in the end, Seattle voters were having none of it. They passed 1A with an overwhelming 62% approval.

How to succeed – key lessons

The success has several lessons.

First, focus on critical human needs being inadequately served by existing systems. In Seattle, the cost and availability of reasonably priced housing is a crying need.

Second, people acting in place focused on the needs of people in the place can build broad coalitions. The listing of labor unions, civil society organizations and political figures endorsing 1A is here. It is an example of the kind of community solidarity we need.

Third, draw out the connections between issues to broaden alliances and support. In this case, House Our Neighbors made the connection of climate and housing. Noting that 35% of climate pollution comes from buildings, the effort mandates highly efficient passivhaus construction. Having affordable housing in the city also reduces suburban sprawl with all the driving it entails. Climate groups including 350 Seattle, understanding that housing is a climate issue, did significant on-the-ground campaigning to help 1A pass.

Fourth, economic justice has a strong draw. In a society where wealth has flowed to the top, people are ready to claw some back to restore the balance. In this case, the tech boom that has driven housing costs through the roof is leveraged to address the consequences.

There’s plenty of bad news crowding us, and plenty to resist. At the same time, there’s great potential for forward motion in our communities. The Seattle social housing victory is a practical example.

We don’t have to sink in despair. We can move for change where we live, grow powerful coalitions, and make change. We are not powerless, and the closer to home we act, the more powerful we are. We are in for some hard times, but in addressing human survival needs such as housing by creating community alliances and institutions, we can build the solidarity we need for the long-term.

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