types

The Black Lives Matter counterinsurgency

Study materials on the containment & co-optation—largely from “within”—of a Black liberation movement struggling to be [re]born.


Cars, guns, autonomy: On the finer points of the recent revolt in Ferguson, MO, October 2014.

Keyanna Celina, How Black Lives Matter L.A. Undermined and Co-Opted the Movement for Ezell Ford, January 2015.

  • Read on Tumblr here.

Raven Rakia & Aaron Miguel Cantú, The Fight For The Soul Of The Black Lives Matter Movement, April 2015.

  • Read without supplying an email address here.

Bobby London, How to Kill A Movement, April 2015.

Drew Franklin, Why DeRay Mckesson’s Baltimore Campaign Looks Like It Comes Right Out of Teach for America’s Playbook, February 2016.

Mass Action for Black Liberation, Why Black Lives Matter: Cincinnati Is Changing Its Name, March 2018.

Glen Ford, Black Lives Matter Founder Launches Huge Project to Shrink Black Lives, 2019 (republished with editorial commentary April 2022).

[Elizabeth] Warren endorsed by Black Lives Matter co-founder’s Black to the Future Action Fund, February 2020.

Martin Schoots-McAlpine, Anatomy of a counter-insurgency: Efforts to undermine the George Floyd uprising, July 2020.

Official Statement from Samaria Rice, mother of Tamir Rice, and Lisa Simpson, mother of Richard Risher, March 2021.

Color Of Change ordered to reinstate illegally laid off workers and pay back wages after NLRB Ruling, September 2024.