Young Lords and the Struggle for Racial Justice and Public Health in New York

While social scientists understand the movements built by people of color in the 60s within the framework of civil and political rights, narrowly defined, deeper study reveals the range of social problems with which these movements were concerned. Focusing on the activism of the Young Lords in NY, the Puerto Rican counterpart to the Black Panthers, this talk explores 1) how the nation's postwar racial economy created a crisis in public health for urban dwellers and 2) the forces that propelled the Young Lords (and by extension the Black Panthers) to orient so much of its work around issues of Public Health. For ex, in 1973, the American Journal of Public Health credited Young Lord activism for the passage of NY's anti-lead poisoning legislation, and in 1970, the Young Lords' 12-hour occupation of Lincoln Hospital in the Bronx dramatized the healthcare crisis in poor black and Latino communities; challenged the advent of privatization policies in the public sector, and led to the creation of one of the principle acupuncture drug treatment centers in the western world. This talk will ANALYZE 1) the postwar demographic, social and economic forces that made health such an important feature of activism in northern cities in the 60s 2) the coalitions that radical Puerto Rican and African American activists built alongside healthcare staff in the run-up to the takeover of Lincoln Hospital 3) the relevance of this history, and the relationship between racial justice and the struggle for public health in the Sixties and today.