Chapter 4
The Ethics of Means and Ends: Pragmatic Morality
The question of ethics in revolutionary action has plagued movements throughout history, creating tension between idealistic moral principles and practical necessity. Alinsky offers ten rules for the ethics of means and ends that challenge conventional moral thinking, providing a framework for understanding how ethical considerations operate in real-world political struggles.
First, concern with ethics increases proportionally with the number of means available. When one has only one option, it automatically becomes "moral" by necessity - a starving person stealing food has made an ethical choice by default. Similarly, resistance movements with limited resources often employ tactics they might otherwise reject. Second, the less important the end goal, the more one can afford to engage in ethical evaluations of means - major societal transformations may require compromises that would be unnecessary for minor reforms.
Third, history consistently judges the same action differently based on outcome - making the critical difference between being labeled a "traitor" or celebrated as a "founding father." The American revolutionaries, once considered rebels and criminals by the British Crown, became heroic figures after their victory. Fourth, ethical judgment depends heavily on whether actions are employed during imminent defeat or assured victory. This contextual framework explains the ongoing ethical debate around the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, which occurred when Japan's defeat was certain rather than when America was vulnerable after Pearl Harbor. The timing of the action, not just the action itself, shapes its moral evaluation.
Fifth, any effective means is automatically judged unethical by opponents - a pattern that repeats throughout history. Revolutionary hero Francis Marion's guerrilla tactics were denounced by the British as ungentlemanly and unchristian, though similar tactics were later adopted by conventional military forces. Sixth, pragmatic leaders do what they can with available resources and "clothe it with moral garments." This explains Gandhi's use of passive resistance in India - not necessarily because of moral superiority but because it was the only effective means available given India's lack of military capacity against British imperial power.
The pragmatic revolutionary understands that moral judgments are relative and often determined by who holds power - victors write history and define its moral parameters. This doesn't mean abandoning ethics entirely, but rather recognizing that effective action requires moral flexibility within reasonable bounds. The Civil Rights Movement, for example, combined moral authority with tactical disruption, understanding that pure moral suasion alone rarely creates change. The ends don't justify any means, but they do require means that actually work - ineffective moral purity serves no one.
This framework challenges activists to think deeply about the relationship between idealism and pragmatism, recognizing that moral considerations must be balanced against practical effectiveness. Historical examples from the American Revolution to modern social movements demonstrate that successful change often requires operating in moral gray areas while maintaining core ethical principles.
Chapter 5
The Power of Words: Reclaiming Revolutionary Language
The passions of mankind have boiled over into politics, staining its vocabulary with human hurts and frustrations. Words like "politics" itself, along with "power," "self-interest," "compromise," and "conflict" have become twisted, viewed as evil. This reveals our prevailing political illiteracy.
Why not use gentler words that don't trigger negative emotional reactions? Because substituting euphemisms dilutes meaning and creates an aseptic imitation of life. In politics, we deal with slaves and Caesars, not vestal virgins. Power is the right word-changing it changes everything we're discussing.
Power, meaning "ability to act," has become an evil word suggesting something sinister. We misquote Lord Acton as "Power corrupts" when he actually said "Power tends to corrupt." The corruption isn't in power but in ourselves. Power is the essence of life-the heart pumping blood, citizens participating for common purpose. It can be a man-killing explosive or a life-saving drug, used to enforce slavery or achieve freedom.
Self-interest wears the black shroud of negativism, often equated with selfishness. This myth of altruism as our motivator could only arise in a society bundled in Puritan morality and Madison Avenue public relations. From Judaeo-Christian teachers to economists, self-interest has always been recognized as mankind's prime moving force.
Compromise suggests weakness, betrayal of ideals, surrender of principles. But to the organizer, compromise is beautiful-it's making the deal, getting that vital breather, usually the victory. Starting with nothing, demanding 100%, then compromising for 30% means you're 30% ahead. A free society is ongoing conflict interrupted by compromises.
Conflict has become a bad word due to organized religion's "turn the other cheek" rhetoric and Madison Avenue's consensus culture. Yet conflict is the essential core of a free society. If democracy were a musical score, its major theme would be the harmony of dissonance.
Chapter 6
The Education of an Organizer: Essential Qualities for Change
Building mass power organizations requires finding and training organizers-a major challenge in any movement. The ideal organizer possesses qualities that may not all be teachable, but must be identified and developed:
Curiosity that knows no limits, constantly questioning accepted patterns. This questioning spirit is the essence of rebellion-"a people asking 'why' are beginning to rebel."
Irreverence that challenges dogma while maintaining deep reverence for life's meaning. The organizer detests dogma, defies finite definitions of morality, and rebels against repression of free inquiry.
Imagination that fuels both motivation and tactical thinking. Beyond mental imaging of the unseen, it's the dynamic force driving organization for change, enabling identification with mankind's suffering.
A sense of humor essential for maintaining sanity and understanding life's contradictions. Humor is also tactically vital-satire and ridicule are mankind's most potent weapons.
A blurred vision of a better world to sustain through monotonous daily work. Like an artist painting just one tiny leaf, the organizer sees himself as part of a great mural where each contributes to the whole.
An organized personality to function effectively in disorganized situations, remaining rational amid irrationalities. The organizer accepts that "with very rare exceptions, the right things are done for the wrong reasons."
A political schizoid nature-able to polarize issues to "100 percent angels versus 100 percent devils" to motivate action, while simultaneously knowing the real difference might be only 10 percent.
A monumental ego-unreserved confidence in their ability to do what must be done. With this ego strength, "he is a doer and does" without thoughts of quitting.
A free and open mind that accepts life's uncertainty and the relativity of values. The organizer's greatest joy is creation itself-for him, "hell would be doing the same thing over and over again."
Unlike leaders who build power for themselves, the organizer creates power for others to use. This fundamental distinction shapes everything they do.
Chapter 7
The Art of Communication: Entering Others' Experience
Communication is the one indispensable quality of an organizer. If people don't understand what you're trying to convey, you're simply not there. Effective communication requires entering the experience of your audience, as people only understand things in terms of their own experience.
When you can't find a point in the other person's experience to connect with, you must create an experience for them. Going outside people's experience creates confusion rather than communication. Even religious leaders must be approached through self-interest rather than religious doctrine, since living Christianity is outside the experience of most church-goers.
Effective persuasion requires understanding the other party's core values. Moses didn't appeal to God's mercy after the Golden Calf incident but instead maneuvered based on God's prime value of wanting to be "Number 1," pointing out how destroying the Israelites would damage God's reputation.
People must make their own decisions. The skilled organizer never directly tells a community what to do but uses loaded questions to guide them toward the desired conclusion. The organizer initially functions as a general who knows the way forward but never wears "four stars"-instead guiding through questions while respecting people's dignity.
Communication must be grounded in specific experiences people can grasp, not abstract concepts. When activists tell poor people that material success won't bring happiness, the response is predictable: "Let me be the judge of that." Statistics about mass tragedies remain just numbers, while personal connections create emotional impact.
Issues must be communicated simply enough to serve as rallying cries-not vague concepts like "immorality" but specific examples like "this slum landlord with this tenement where these people suffer." General theories only become meaningful after understanding specific constituents.
Chapter 8
Building Power: From First Steps to Lasting Change
When entering a community, an organizer must first establish legitimacy. The community's suspicion of strangers means the organizer must position himself within their experience. Beginning with proclamations of love turns people off, while denouncing exploitative landlords or police corruption connects with their reality.
The effective organizer must maneuver the establishment into publicly attacking him as a "dangerous enemy." This identification with the Have-Nots is crucial, as power and fear are essential to developing faith. When the establishment brands the organizer as "dangerous," they reveal their fear of him, giving him his "birth certificate" to begin organizing.
From the moment an organizer enters a community, their singular focus must be building a mass power base-their "army." Until this foundation exists, they confront no major issues because they lack the means. Every action revolves around one central question: how many recruits will this bring into the organization?
The fundamental equation is simple: change comes from power, and power comes from organization. The organizer's essential task is building people's confidence that they can accomplish something through collective action. This requires carefully selecting winnable battles to build momentum through limited victories.
Contrary to popular belief, there's no such thing as a "disorganized community"-it's a contradiction in terms. Every community is organized in some fashion, even if organized around apathy, resignation, or despair. Therefore, the first step in community organization is community disorganization-disrupting the prevailing patterns to create space for new ones that enable participation.
When organizing begins, people often don't know what they want. People who feel powerless don't think deeply about changing bad situations-why contemplate spending a million dollars you'll never have? Once organized with power to make changes, people begin asking meaningful questions and seeking solutions. They show competence and seek professional counsel.
The organizer understands that resolving one problem brings another, but doesn't mention this to avoid creating futility. As power grows, policy demands evolve-what was once sufficient becomes inadequate as expectations rise.
Chapter 9
Tactical Warfare: Rules for Effective Action
The fundamental rules of power tactics begin with understanding that power is not only what you have but what the enemy thinks you have. Never go outside your people's experience, but whenever possible go outside the enemy's experience to cause confusion.
Make the enemy live up to their own rules-they can't, and this will destroy them. Ridicule is man's most potent weapon as it's nearly impossible to counterattack. Use tactics your people enjoy, and don't let tactics drag on too long.
Keep pressure constant with varied actions, remembering that threats are often more terrifying than the actual action. The real action is in the enemy's reaction-when properly goaded, the enemy becomes your greatest strength.
In complex urban societies, identifying the enemy becomes increasingly difficult as responsibility shifts between jurisdictions and individuals. The target constantly tries to evade responsibility, so change agents must pin them down securely. Attacking abstract entities like "segregated practices" or "City Hall" is ineffective-targets must be personified.
Once a target is chosen, polarization is essential. A leader may weigh a 52/48 percent decision privately, but once decided must treat the cause as 100 percent positive and opposition as 100 percent negative. Qualifying attacks with humanizing remarks about the target being "a good churchgoer" is political idiocy.
Timing is the essential difference between tactical success and failure. A critical rule: never let conflict drag on too long. Human beings can sustain interest, emotional fervor, and physical energy in any challenging experience only for limited periods before it becomes monotonous.
Tactics must constantly evolve as enemies develop countermeasures. Even spontaneous, revolutionary tactics require immediate rationale development by organizers to give them meaning and purpose.
The basic tactic against the Haves is mass political jujitsu: yielding in planned ways that make the superior strength of the Haves become their undoing. Since they publicly pose as custodians of responsibility, morality, law, and justice, they can be constantly pushed to live up to their own book of rules-which no organization can fully do.
Chapter 10
The Proxy Revolution: Democratizing Corporate America
The development of tactics isn't a product of careful reasoning-it emerges from accident, unpredictable reactions, necessity and improvisation. The organizer must embrace apparent disorganization, going with the action while remaining free and open to opportunities.
The proxy tactic exemplifies this organic tactical development. In our middle-class society with its conglomerate corporate economy, masses of Americans are ready for major confrontations with corporate power. This approach attracts even those who reject street demonstrations but still want political action.
The proxy tactic originated during the conflict between Eastman Kodak and FIGHT, a black ghetto organization in Rochester. When Kodak repudiated an agreement, traditional demonstrations wouldn't work since Kodak's vulnerability wasn't in Rochester but in its national markets. The breakthrough came when the National Unitarian Convention passed a resolution giving their proxies to FIGHT, revealing the political potential of this approach.
The proxy tactic's real power emerged when Alinsky realized its political implications. Politicians would take notice when churches and large membership organizations assigned proxies to activist groups, as these organizations represented voters. By obtaining proxies in multiple interconnected corporations, organizers could leverage pressure throughout the corporate network.
The proxy approach offered a key to middle-class participation in activism. Instead of corporate-controlled annual meetings, companies could be forced to hold them in stadiums where thousands of proxy holders could attend. What could be more American than stockholders exercising their rights?
Proxies can provide an effective path to influencing the Pentagon. Imagine a general offering a $50 million contract for nerve gas to a corporation, only to be told, "We can't accept it-our stockholders would create hell at the next meeting." The general suddenly realizes that thousands of mainstream Americans oppose these weapons.
Corporations will fight back, warning stockholders that rejecting war contracts or implementing pollution controls will reduce dividends. But by then, stockholders will find more satisfaction in their campaigns than in dividend checks. America's corporations represent a spiritual slum whose arrogance threatens our future as a free society.
Chapter 11
The Path Forward: Organizing the Middle Class for Change
Organization for action must now center upon America's white middle class-that's where the power is. With over three-fourths of Americans identifying as middle class economically, their action or inaction will determine our direction. Even if all low-income populations united in coalition, they would lack sufficient power for fundamental change without middle-class allies.
Our activists and radicals must make a complete turnabout. Having rejected middle-class values as materialistic and corrupt, they must now recognize the priceless value of their middle-class experience for organizing "their own people." They must build bridges of communication, grasping middle-class sensitivities.
The lower middle class consists of people who've struggled their entire lives for relatively little. Their lives are dominated by fear-of retirement with inflation-decimated Social Security, unemployment, job competition from minorities, illness costs, and property devaluation. This group includes hard hats, police, firefighters, teachers, civil servants, and mechanics. They view the poor as parasites receiving benefits they pay for, developing bitter resentment.
Many lower middle-class Americans belong to labor unions, churches, bowling clubs, and fraternal organizations. We must work with them with respect and understanding-to reject them is to lose them by default. Even if we cannot win them over completely, we must establish communication and partial agreements.
The rest of the middle class lives in suburbia in partial escape. Despite achieving the American dream-split-level house, two cars, country club membership-they've discovered it's hollow. The radical's job is to reach these numb, bewildered middle-class Americans by bringing hope and communicating tactics that give them a sense of power.
The revolution must extend to the corporate sector. Corporations must abandon the notion of separate "private sectors"-every American individual or corporation is both public and private, with commitment to national welfare. Poverty, discrimination, disease and crime must concern corporations as much as profits.
The human cry of this second American Revolution is for meaning and purpose-"a cause to live for and if need be die for." We've lost the great American dream, forgetting where we came from, not knowing where we are, and fearing where we're going. When Americans can no longer see the stars, the times are tragic. We must believe this darkness precedes the dawn of a beautiful new world.
