Revolutionaries in the Halls of Power: Kshama Sawant, the New Insurgent Politics, and the Fight for 21st Century Socialism

From inside Kshama Sawant's historic tenure in Seattle City Hall comes a blueprint for 21st-century socialists, a counterpoint to the strategies favored by The Squad and other progressive activists. Seattle was the first major city to mandate a $15 minimum wage; the first to implement a payroll tax on Amazon to build affordable housing; the first to secure a bevy of renters' rights laws, making good on the slogan, "Housing is a human right." Behind these remarkable breakthroughs in the 2010s stood a small but feisty Marxist movement, Socialist Alternative, and the City Council member they helped to elect, Kshama Sawant. In a municipal government dominated by pro-business Democrats, Sawant and the popular street movements she led against major corporations headquartered in the region-including Amazon, Boeing, Microsoft, and Starbucks-won battles that would transform the city's trajectory for years to come. We're Coming for You and Your Rotten System tells this extraordinary story from the inside. Rosenblum, who worked in Sawant's office and alongside community activists throughout this dynamic decade, weaves together intimate story-telling and political analysis to show how and why the movement succeeded where other progressive outsiders-such as Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez-have failed. For political activists searching desperately to make sense of the world after the reelection of Donald Trump, the Seattle experience offers a vital framework for fighting our way out of the despairing miasma of 21st-century capitalism.

About the Author :
Jonathan Rosenblum is an organizer and writer with 40 years of leadership in grassroots union and community work in the US and Canada. He led the first successful Fight for $15 campaign and subsequently wrote the book, Beyond $15: Immigrant Workers, Faith Activists, and the Revival of the Labor Movement (Beacon Press, 2017). Working closely with socialist Seattle City Councilmember Kshama Sawant between 2014 and 2024, he helped organize movements to win the first $15 minimum wage in a major US city; breakthrough renters' rights legislation; and the historic tax on Amazon to fund affordable housing and Green New Deal projects. Jonathan assisted the UAW in the largest academic worker strike in US history, the 2022 strike by 48,000 University of California graduate student workers and postdocs. Jonathan has worked closely with Amazon workers organizing in the US and abroad, and he consults frequently with unions and political groups in the US and Canada on campaigns to build power for working people. Jonathan is a long-time member of the National Writers Union and in 2024 was elected National Recording Secretary. He is a member and past board president of Kadima (Jewish) Reconstructionist Community in Seattle, where he lives with his amazing wife Carolyn and their equally amazing two daughters, Natalya and Tamar.

Review :
“Here is the book that the political establishment doesn’t want you to read.” —Kshama Sawant “Rosenblum challenges the socialist left—through his sober analysis and concrete examples—to take on the too-often ignored rich potentials of municipal-based politics.” —Sam Gindin “This book will be immensely inspiring to both activists and academics. It's just what we need right now.” —Jamie Gough, retired faculty, University of Sheffield, England, and co-author of The Challenges of the New Social Democracy. “An inspiring story and a useful tool for activists.” —Publishers Weekly “Written for a general audience rather than just for organizers . . . a narrative page-turner populated with heroes and villains, gut-wrenching setbacks and almost unimaginably tangible triumphs.” —Declaration News