Red Chicago: American Communism at Its Grassroots, 1928-35 (Working Class in American History) - Softcover

Storch, Randi

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0252076389 ISBN 13: 9780252076381

Publisher: University of Illinois Press, 2008

Synopsis

Red Chicago is a social history of American Communism set within the context of Chicago's neighborhoods, industries, and radical traditions. Using local party records, oral histories, union records, party newspapers, and government documents, Randi Storch fills the gap between Leninist principles and the day-to-day activities of Chicago's rank-and-file Communists.

Uncovering rich new evidence from Moscow's former party archive, Storch argues that although the American Communist Party was an international organization strongly influenced by the Soviet Union, at the city level it was a more vibrant and flexible organization responsible to local needs and concerns. Thus, while working for a better welfare system, fairer unions, and racial equality, Chicago's Communists created a movement that at times departed from international party leaders' intentions. By focusing on the experience of Chicago's Communists, who included a large working-class, African American, and ethnic population, this study reexamines party members' actions as an integral part of the communities and industries in which they lived and worked.

About this title

About the Author:

Randi Storch is an associate professor of history at the State University of New York College at Cortland.

Review:

"Storch's new book effectively kicks off the beginning of a new wave of American Communist Party historiography. . . . Highly recommended."--Choice

"Red Chicago is thoroughly researched, the prose lucid and felicitous, and its arguments clearly made. This is Storch's first book, and it marks her as a young historian of promise."--Journal of American History

"Storch's solid new book . . . [is] the beginning of a 'fourth wave' of historiography of the American Communist Party."--History: Review of New Books

"A must-read and a thrilling story for anyone interested in learning the tactics and hidden history of the CP's mass organizing in the 1930s."--International Socialist Review

About this edition

• Publisher: University of Illinois Press
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0252076389
• ISBN 13: 9780252076381
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 320