From the Publisher
Praise for How We Win the Civil War:
“Politically charged, thoughtfully reasoned.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“Spirited and persuasive, this is a rousing call for change.”
—Publishers Weekly
"How We Win the Civil War is well positioned to shape election outcomes, policy outcomes, and debates about the future of multiracial democracy.”
—ACS Expert Forum
“Steve Phillips reminds us that the Civil War was a war for democracy, and that the struggle against racism in American society and politics has always been a struggle for democracy. He shows, further, that in our own time, we can save democracy from right wing authoritarianism by mobilizing Black, Latino, and Asian American voters rather than chasing the elusive ‘middle’ of the electorate. It’s not only good politics, it’s a strategy that has worked.”
—Mae Ngai, author of The Chinese Question
"How We Win the Civil War by Steve Phillips is a seminal and urgent work. It is both a practical guide and a call to our moral imagination to rise to the challenge of completing the unfinished business of America. It is truly valuable for anyone committed to building a multiracial democracy that leaves no one behind."
—Senator Cory Booker
Kirkus Reviews
2022-08-10
It’s 2022—high time, Phillips urges, to finally defeat the Confederacy.
We must choose “between democracy and whiteness,” writes Phillips, author of Brown Is the New White. The democracy of which he writes is an anti–White supremacist, multiracial, and multicultural one. The Whiteness is that of the Confederate constitution, exemplified by the declaration of the Confederacy’s vice president that “the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition.” Though there’s some stridency to Phillips’ argument, it’s not hyperbolic. The emergence of a neo-Confederate White supremacist movement, abetted by the Trump administration, and recent Republican efforts to suppress the ethnic-minority vote are of a piece with the past. Phillips characterizes this continuity as the product of a “Confederate Battle Plan” that has five major planks, including never giving an inch while insisting, say, that elections have been stolen and White people disenfranchised, as well as “rewriting the laws so that they don’t lose again.” Inimical to a true multiracial democracy, this battle plan has been refined and sharpened—and it’s in place today. Against it, Phillips proposes a “Liberation Battle Plan” with components that include the demand that Democrats stop trying to accommodate and compromise with those “who are waging an unrelenting, centuries-long war in defense of their cherished belief that America should be a white nation.” Leading this battle in its most recent skirmishes are Black activists, particularly Black women such as Georgia’s Stacey Abrams. These leaders “don’t look like the traditional white male model of intelligence and competence,” but they are obviously capable of unexpected victories, aided by smart use of hard data and clearly defined plans of attack, all in the interest of arriving at “a social contract for the society we want to live in.”
A politically charged, thoughtfully reasoned call to rally around the flag—and not the Stars and Bars, to be sure.
