Standing Strong in Undemocratic Times

Many of the nation’s most eminent education scholars and researchers describe constructive and effective ways to respond to and resist the attacks on diversity and multicultural education and to support democracy.

In this timely volume, James A. Banks and a stellar group of contributors push back on the national and cogent attacks on diversity and multicultural education, both of which have accelerated after the 2024 presidential election. Each chapter author (1) describes the difficulties for diversity, multicultural education, and democracy during the next decade and (2) offers interventions and actions that can be taken by educators and policymakers to lessen and reduce these challenges.

Standing Strong in Undemocratic Times describes ways in which democracy is fragile and endangered in the United States and how teaching about diversity in schools, colleges, and universities can help to promote democracy in the nation.

Book Features:

• Describes the origins and nature of the attacks on DEI and of teaching about race in America’s schools, colleges, and universities.
• Provides information, research, and strategies that can give educators hope and ways to envision the future of diversity and multicultural education programs.
• Explores how opponents of diversity and multicultural education have perpetuated misinformation, such as the claim that critical race theory is being taught in K–12 schools.
• Includes contributions by three cohorts of multicultural education scholars: the founders, the second generation, and the most recent researchers in the field.
• Examines how fascism and authoritarianism are growing in the United States and how education in schools, colleges, and universities can counter these forces.

CONTENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS
Preface James A. Banks
Introduction James A. Banks

PART I: RACISM, FASCISM, AND THE QUEST FOR EQUITY AND DEMOCRACY

1. Surviving a Second Nadir: Resisting the Rightist Destruction of Democracy, Gloria Ladson-Billings
2. DEI, Democracy, and the Authoritarian Threat: Why Higher Education Must Resist, Royel M. Johnson
3. White Racial Shame and the Permanence of Racism: A Critical Hope Response, Robin DiAngelo
4. Rise of Fascism in the United States: A Critical Multicultural Anti-Fascist Response, Michael Vavrus

PART II: REVITALIZING DIVERSITY AND MULTICULTURAL EDUCATION

1. Whites in Multicultural Education: Retrospective and Reflection, Gary Howard
2. Resisting Resistance to Diversity, Geneva Gay
3. Possibilities and Obligations of Critical Scholars When Knowledge Production Is Under Siege, Michelle Fine and Lois Weis
4. (Re-)Envisioning the Transformative Power of Multicultural Education, Gilberto Q. Conchas and Victor DeAlba
5. In the Wake of Anti-Woke: Education, Racism Without Races, and Breaking With Symmetricism, Zeus Leonardo

PART III: CURRICULUM AND TEACHING

1. Confronting Educational Inequity in the United States: Daring to Hope, Sonia Nieto
2. Curriculum for a Diverse Democracy, Christine E. Sleeter
3. Culturally Responsive Pedagogy for Immigrant-Origin Students, Carola Suárez-Orozco

PART IV: REENVISIONING THE FUTURE OF DEMOCRACY, DIVERSITY, AND CITIZENSHIP

1. DEI Disaster Recovery in America’s K–12 Schools and Higher Education Institutions, Shaun Harper
2. Redefining Membership: Executive Actions and the Boundaries of Citizenship, Angela M. Banks
3. Teaching Towards Expansive Solidarities in Dangerous Times, Wayne Au

Afterword: Diversity as a Vehicle for Promoting Democracy, Cherry A. McGee Banks

James A. Banks is the Kerry and Killinger Endowed Chair of Diversity Studies Emeritus
at the University of Washington Seattle, past president of the National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) and the American Educational Research Association (AERA), and a member of the National Academy of Education and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

“This book does much more than engage the intellectual, emotional, and ethical—it inspires the very soul of readers. As we research, more deeply understand, and navigate these stubbornly orchestrated times, policies, and practices designed to dismantle progress toward a democracy, this is just the book we need to reawaken our commitments to fight for a world we need and our children deserve. Although coordinated, bold, selfish, and dangerous moves and movements attempt to wear us down, this is the book we need to persevere—reembrace and defend We the People. Grounded in research, history, experience, facts, and ultimately truth, Banks and colleagues have produced an essential new text.”
—H. Richard Milner IV, Cornelius Vanderbilt Professor of Education, Vanderbilt University

“Once again, James Banks has published a timely and profoundly important volume on issues of critical importance. By bringing together many of the nation's most talented scholars on diversity, equity, and inclusion, Standing Strong provides the justification we need to continue to defend the effort to make America a more just and equitable society.”
—Pedro A. Noguera, Distinguished Professor of Education and dean, Rossier School of Education, University of Southern California

“As the father of multicultural education, James Banks has long been at the forefront of illuminating how education can cultivate inclusive and just societies. This timely volume, edited by Professor Banks, brings together distinguished scholars to examine both the role and immense possibilities of multicultural education in a context marked by surging authoritarianism and mounting challenges to democracy.
This book is much more than an essential resource; it is an invitation to engage rigorously and critically with our collective responsibilities as educators and citizens at a moment when democratic values are contested in many countries. Its chapters situate the current threats to diversity, equity, and democratic norms within a broader historical and global perspective, offering concrete pathways for educators committed to safeguarding democracy through their daily practice. In doing so, Banks and his contributors remind us that multicultural education is never a neutral or apolitical endeavor. Rather, it is central to the sustenance—and strengthening—of democracy itself.
At a time when book bans, censorship, and attacks on diversity initiatives threaten to narrow the horizons of our students and societies, this book powerfully reaffirms the enduring importance of critical scholarship and the transformative potential of education. I commend Professor Banks and his collaborators for providing us with such a compelling invitation to reflection and action, and I strongly recommend this book to all educators, scholars, and policymakers concerned with the future of education and democracy.”
—Fernando M. Reimers, Ford Foundation Professor of Practice in International Education, Harvard Graduate School of Education