‘If you want justice, organize for power!’ Community organising, Catholicism and Chicago school reform

Abstract

ABSTRACT Since 1980, Chicago’s United Neighborhood Organization (UNO) has been a major player in school reform, organising Mexican-American communities to build a neighbourhood high school, founding a local technical institute, passing radical school governance reform, and launching a major charter network. At UNO’s apex in 2013, a corruption scandal brought its dramatic fall. Yet, despite its recent ignominious history, its origins reflected a vision well worth recapturing. Supported by churches and community groups, Mexican-Americans organised for their children’s schooling, and then trained others to do the same. Arising during a transitional political period in Chicago, UNO’s original animating vision drew upon two main factors: Saul Alinsky’s long relationship with the Catholic Church, and the emergence of a post-Alinsky model of faith-based community organising. Local activist mexicana leadership played a central role, exemplified in the work of Teresa Fraga, an experienced organiser and UNO Chicago’s first President, and Mary Gonzales, UNO’s co-founder.