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The protestors that comprised the Occupy Wall Street movement came from diverse backgrounds. But how were these activists—who sought radical social change through many ideologies—able to break down oppressions and obstacles within the movement? And in what ways did the movement perpetuate status-quo structures of inequality?  

Are We the 99%? is the first comprehensive feminist and intersectional analysis of the Occupy movement. Heather McKee Hurwitz considers how women, people of color, and genderqueer activists struggled to be heard and understood. Despite cries of “We are the 99%,” signaling solidarity, certain groups were unwelcome or unable to participate. Moreover, problems with racism, sexism, and discrimination due to sexuality and class persisted within the movement.  

Using immersive first-hand accounts of activists’ experiences, online communications, and media coverage of the movement, Hurwitz reveals lessons gleaned from the conflicts within the Occupy movement. She compares her findings to those of other contemporary protest movements—nationally and globally—so that future movements can avoid infighting and deploy an “intersectional imperative” to embrace both diversity and inclusivity.

In Arizona’s Quest for Reform, David R. Berman traces the rise and fall of a dynamic coalition of socialists, labor activists, and progressive Democrats led by the influential Governor George Hunt as they pursued sweeping reforms in a rapidly changing state. From the fight for workers’ rights and women’s suffrage to the use of the initiative process and the role of radical newspapers, Berman brings to life the people and movements that shaped Arizona’s early political identity.

Drawing on extensive primary sources and organized in a clear chronological structure, Berman’s study reveals the tensions, alliances, and dramatic events that defined Arizona’s reform efforts between 1900 and 1920. The book explores the impact of powerful mining interests, railroad companies, and labor unions, while also examining the racialization of Mexican miners and their evolving role in the labor movement. Through vivid storytelling and rigorous scholarship, Berman uncovers the complexities of political change in a state straddling the transition from territory to statehood.

This landmark work will appeal to scholars of western history, labor studies, and political science, as well as general readers interested in Arizona’s unique place in the national Progressive movement. Arizona’s Quest for Reform not only deepens our understanding of the past but also offers timely insights into the enduring challenges of coalition building, grassroots activism, and political reform. It is a vital contribution to the study of Arizona and the American West.

Four men played leading roles in the political drama that unfolded in South Texas during the first decades of this century:

• James B. Wells, who ruled as boss of Cameron County and served as leading conservative spokesman of the Democratic Party in Texas;
• Archer (Archie) Parr, whose ruthless tactics and misuse of public funds in Duval County established him as one of the most notoriously corrupt politicians in Texas history;
• Manuel Guerra, Mexican American rancher and merchant whose domination of Starr County mirrored the rule of his Anglo counterparts in the border region;
• John Nance Garner, who served the interests of these bosses of South Texas as he set forth on the road that would lead him to the United States vice-presidency.

Evan Anders's Boss Rule in South Texas tells the story of these men and the county rings they shaped in South Texas during the Progressive Era.

Power was the byword of the bosses of the Lower Rio Grande Valley, and Anders explores the sources of that power. These politicos did not shirk from using corrupt and even violent means to attain their goals, but Anders demonstrates that their keen sensitivity to the needs of their diverse constituency was key to their long-term success. Patronage and other political services were their lifeblood, and the allies gained by these ranged from developers and businessmen to ranchers and Mexican Americans, wealthy and poor.

Besides examining the workings of the Democratic machines of four South Texas counties, Anders explores the role of the Hispanic populace in shaping the politics of the border region, the economic development of the Lower Rio Grande Valley and its political repercussions, the emergence and nature of progressive movements at both local and state levels, and the part played by the Texas Rangers in supporting bossism in South Texas.

A far-reaching examination of how America came to treat street and corporate crime so differently.

While America incarcerates its most marginalized citizens at an unparalleled rate, the nation has never developed the capacity to consistently prosecute corporate wrongdoing. Dual Justice unearths the intertwined histories of these two phenomena and reveals that they constitute more than just modern hypocrisy.

By examining the carceral and regulatory states’ evolutions from 1870 through today, Anthony Grasso shows that America’s divergent approaches to street and corporate crime share common, self-reinforcing origins. During the Progressive Era, scholars and lawmakers championed naturalized theories of human difference to justify instituting punitive measures for poor offenders and regulatory controls for corporate lawbreakers. These ideas laid the foundation for dual justice systems: criminal justice institutions harshly governing street crime and regulatory institutions governing corporate misconduct.

Since then, criminal justice and regulatory institutions have developed in tandem to reinforce politically constructed understandings about who counts as a criminal. Grasso analyzes the intellectual history, policy debates, and state and federal institutional reforms that consolidated these ideas, along with their racial and class biases, into America’s legal system.

Often overlooked in labor history, the hoboes who rode the rails in search of seasonal work nevertheless secured a place in the American imagination. Frank Tobias Higbie weaves together history, anthropology, gender studies, and literary analysis to reposition these workers at the center of Progressive Era debates over class, race, manly responsibility, community, and citizenship. Combining incisive cultural criticism with labor history, Higbie illustrates how these so-called marginal figures were in fact integral to communities and to cultural conflicts over class, masculinity, and sexuality. He draws from life histories, the investigations of social reformers, and the organizing materials of the Industrial Workers of the World to present a complex portrait of hobo life, from its often violent and dangerous working conditions to its ethic of “transient mutuality” that enabled survival and resistance on the road. 

Frank and compelling,Indispensable Outcasts examines hoboes within the sprawling story of American labor while meditating on writing history from the bottom up and the ways a fascination with personal narrative can color a historian's work.

Despite St. Louis’s mid-twentieth-century reputation as a conservative and sleepy midwestern metropolis, the city and its surrounding region have long played host to dynamic forms of social-movement organizing. This was especially the case during the 1960s and 1970s, when a new generation of local activists lent their energies to the ongoing struggles for Black freedom, lesbian and gay liberation, feminist social transformations, environmental protection, an end to the Vietnam War, and more. This volume, the first of its kind, offers fifteen scholarly contributions that together bring into focus the exceptional range of progressive activist projects that took shape in a single midwestern city during these tumultuous decades.

In contrast to scholarship that seeks to interpret the era’s social-movement initiatives in a primarily national context, the works presented in this expansive collection emphasize the importance of locality, neighborhood, community institutions, and rooted social networks. Documenting wrenching forces of metropolitan change as well as grassroots resilience, Left in the Midwest shows us how place powerfully shaped agendas, worldviews, and opportunities for the disparate groups that dedicated themselves to progressive visions for their city. By revising our sense of the region’s past, this volume also expands our sense of the possibilities that the future may hold for activist movements seeking change in St. Louis and beyond.
 

George McGovern is chiefly remembered for his landslide loss to Richard Nixon in 1972. Yet at the time, his candidacy raised eyebrows by invoking the prophetic tradition, an element of his legacy that is little studied. In My Brother's Keeper, Mark A. Lempke explores the influence of McGovern's evangelical childhood, Social Gospel worldview, and conscientious Methodism on a campaign that brought antiwar activism into the mainstream.

McGovern's candidacy signified a passing of the torch within Christian social justice. He initially allied with the ecumenical movement and the mainline Protestant churches during a time when these institutions worked easily with liberal statesmen. But the senator also galvanized a dynamic movement of evangelicals rooted in the New Left, who would dominate subsequent progressive religious activism as the mainline entered a period of decline. My Brother's Keeper argues for the influential, and often unwitting, role McGovern played in fomenting a “Religious Left” in 1970s America, a movement that continues to this day. It joins a growing body of scholarship that complicates the dominant narrative of that era's conservative Christianity.

2026 Honorable Mention in Monographs, North American Society for Sport History (NASSH)

The incredible career of the forgotten but foundational pro wrestler who shaped American sports culture. 

William Muldoon was an infamous athlete whose prowess, savvy, and chicanery across his six-decade career led him to wealth, cultural importance, and political power. Muldoon, the child of poor Irish immigrants, began wrestling in the 1870s and quickly became one of the most famous athletes of the post–Civil War era. He started acting and modeling as his popularity grew, making him one of the first sports stars to achieve crossover success. After a triumphant stint rehabilitating fallen boxing heavyweight champion John L. Sullivan in 1889, he retired from the ring and began a new career as a fitness impresario, founding an elite gymnasium and remaking himself as a health authority in the press. He became trainer to the rich, famous, and politically powerful, which led to his appointment as chair of the New York State Athletic Commission in the 1920s. From this position, Muldoon exerted his influence over the rules of boxing and wrestling and weaponized his power to maintain segregation in sport.

The Last Gladiator is a deep, insightful dive into Muldoon’s life and impact, demonstrating the significance of this often-controversial figure in the development of American sports, professional wrestling, and physical and popular culture.

How Tennessee reformers reconciled Southern heritage with rising nationalism, weaving the Lost Cause into the fabric of American progress and identity.

The Lost Cause and the Great War tells the stories of central Tennessee Progressive-era reformers to illustrate the fascinating broader issue of how Southerners steeped in Lost Cause Civil War mythologies simultaneously developed patriotic American fervor. Focusing on Luke Lea, a prominent politician and American army officer who attempted to capture Kaiser Wilhelm II during World War I, the book reveals the intricate interplay between three competing ideas: attachment to the memory of the Confederacy, intense American nationalism, and advocacy for progressive reforms.

Hunt shows that Lea and his contemporaries sought either to harmonize these competing loyalties or to compartmentalize them to use when needed. Through insightful accounts of Tennessee’s 1928 presidential campaign, the American Legion’s response to cuts to veteran benefits in 1933, and the redefinition of America’s global role post–World War II, Hunt shows how these reformers achieved a balance that held until the Civil Rights movement disrupted this delicate consensus.

Hunt’s rich account reveals how Lea and others like him wove national patriotism and Southern collective memory into a cohesive narrative that supported their broader Progressive goals. The book offers much to readers interested in Southern history, the Gilded Age, Prohibition, World War I, World War II, and the beginnings of the Civil Rights movement. It provides vivid examples of how collective memory and narratives shape social and political movements. General readers will discover how white Southerners who remained devoted to vindicating the Confederacy nonetheless became fervent supporters of America's growing nationalism in the early twentieth century.