"At a time when a lot of people are disconnected from actual movements, I hope my father''s legacy reminds you that it is each of our responsibility to participate in changing the world." -- Boots Riley , from the foreword "Walter Riley is one of the great revolutionary thinkers and strategists of our time-often compared with Amilcar Cabral or Walter Rodney. If you didn''t know this before, thanks to Jesse Strauss, now you know. You will find in these pages the critical insight, wisdom, and direction organizers need to meet the moment. And because Riley shares his own story of a life in struggle, you know why he is a beacon of light and brilliance for our movements." -- Robin D. G. Kelley , author of Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination "Walter Riley is my political mentor and hero.

Like Ella Baker, his lifelong commitment to the fight for freedom and justice has been powerful, persistent, and unassuming. As a union organizer, radical movement intellectual, people''s lawyer, and courageous freedom fighter, Walter''s contributions to a wide range of liberation movements over many decades is unmatched. An unflinching opponent of capitalism, colonialism, and racism from Haiti to Oakland, Walter is an exemplary champion of oppressed people the world over. No exaggeration. My only critique of this short bio-narrative is that it should be longer. There are so many important stories Walter could tell us, and lessons he could convey. Read, learn, and be inspired and fortified for the struggles ahead." -- Barbara Ransby , activist, historian, and author of Ella Baker and the Black Freedom Movement "Walter Riley is a Movement Man--the kind of essential organizer/activist/thinker/doer who keeps the Movement moving.

Here is an urgent intergenerational dialogue, the ideal vehicle for unlocking the wisdom of a veteran freedom fighter whose organizing work centers on principled unity and whose vast experience is wholly relevant to the demands of radical movement building today. Riley knows that eighty years is a long time in the life of a man but the blink of an eye in the life of a struggle, and so he''s neither nostalgic for a ship that''s already left the shore nor interested in burnishing a legacy. Rather, he''s still leaning forward, still on the move and in the mix, still asking the most insistent and burning questions: How do we name this political moment? Where do we go from here? What does the known demand of us now? Read Civil Rights and Structural Attacks: Conversations with Walter Riley as a challenge as well as an invitation to join Walter Riley on today''s barricades--we have a world to win." -- Bill Ayers , co-founder of the Weather Underground and author of When Freedom is the Question Abolition is the Answer "The haymaker punch is named after the wide swinging motion of the scythe--the 14th Century agricultural tool used to reap edible grains and chop down undesirables. Name linked to the Latin scindere (to cut), the scythe''s broad arcing swing reaps abundance. Walter Riley''s deft dialectic introduces openness, risk, willingness to struggle, and revolutionary contingency to the scythe''s movement. In Walter''s words: ''A haymaker in boxing is when you don''t know where the punch is going to land but you know it has power in it and you hope it''ll work. At the same time, you leave yourself open.

People tend not to do that in actual boxing, but in this concept of being out in struggle, do some haymakers! Go after folks that are oppressive! Go after institutions! Go after ideas and thought processes that inhibit folks! Be intentional about it! Think about it but don''t hold back!'' This forcefully urgent volume is full of revolutionary insight, a ledger of radical praxis from my friend Walter Riley enriching our understanding of organizations and masses in motion: NAACP, CORE, The Black Panther Party, Progressive Labor Party, Fanmi Lavalas, and so much more. The geographical expanse is vast--NorthCarolina, Chicago, Detroit, Port-au-Prince, and of course, Oakland, California. Walter and Jesse Strauss''s text models through praxis its title formulation of ''Quiet Leadership''--which like Assata Shakur''s notion of the ''reluctant warrior'' opens up a treasure trove of insight informing their respective texts and archive of revolutionary praxis. This includes: the centrality of planning, the problem of leadership, the temptations of individuation, lessons of cadre building, mass base building, active listening, the nuance in Walter''s sense of ''ante-revolutionary'' and anti-revolutionary. Thank you--Walter and Jesse--for this record of struggle--for feeding us, sustaining radical memory and current praxis, and cutting our enemies down to size. The pen is mightier than the scythe, but keep a scythe around just in case. Unite the many to defeat the few and while doing the damn thing--study this book and commence the throwing." -- Jeremy Matthew Glick , author of The Black Radical Tragic: Performance, Aesthetics, and the Unfinished Haitian Revolution "Every city, every town, every village on this planet has iconic figures who spend their entire life being on the side of justice and clarity, being decent and warm hearted.

Walter Riley is that person for northern California--a link to earlier struggles with his eyes firmly positioned on a future that is beyond the ugliness of the present. These conversations offer the education a new generation requires in how to be in the struggle for a lifetime and more." --Vijay Prashad , director, Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research "Throughout his lifetime on the front lines of struggle, Walter Riley''s dialectical clarity has energized and sharpened people''s movements from Durham to Oakland to Haiti to Palestine. Civil Rights and Structural Attacks is not just a memoir but a practical roadmap for the next generation of activists: a profound, personal, and necessary manifesto on revolutionary change guided by core political principles, deep love, and a few well-timed haymakers against the centers of power." --Nora Barrows-Friedman , journalist, author and editor of The Electronic Intifada.