New York's Socialist Scholars Conference Board Splits

To: The Socialist Scholars Conference community.

From: Stanley Aronowitz, Nancy Holmstrom, Manning Marable, Leith
Mullings, Frances Fox Piven, Julia Wrigley.

At its meeting on the evening of May 19th, the Board of the Socialist
Scholars Conference voted by 8 to 7 to terminate the services of our
staff director, Eric Canepa. This move has been afoot for some
months, and we have tried hard to avert it. Now that this decision
has been made, we feel morally obligated to resign from the Board. We
note that the people leaving include a majority of the women and
people of color who have joined the Board.It is with great regret that we, as members of the Steering Committee
and Board of Directors, have come to this decision. We are not
leaving because of the decision regarding Eric, although we opposed
his firing and we greatly value his contributions to the conference.
Rather, we are leaving because we feel that the campaign to
accomplish this was riddled with behavior we regard as politically
unethical, including grossly inaccurate charges that were repeated
even in the face of evidence of their inaccuracy, tirades that were
abusive to the point of derangement, and the recurrent implication
that those of us who objected to these procedures, being newcomers,
were not the "real" board. While these disagreements may not be
political in the large sense of having to do with big issues that
arise in the world outside of the SSC, they are disagreements about
politics — about the ethics of how people should work together
politically. We feel the process has not conformed even minimally to
the ethical requirements of honesty and mutual respect that make
democratic exchange possible. Indeed, we have sadly come to the
conclusion that while we were invited to join the board in the name
of a more inclusive conference, some of the initial organizers do not
in fact want to share their control of the conference.

We feel that now, more than ever, we need a democratic and inclusive
Socialist Scholars Conference. It is our hope that the Board of
Directors will eventually evolve to represent the full political,
gender and racial diversity of all currents of the U.S. left.

If you have any questions or comments, they can be directed to:

ResignedSSCdirectors@soci
alistscholars.org

or

Resigned SSC Directors

217 East 86 Street #143

New York, NY 10028