Join us at The New School’s Auditorium on Tuesday, May 6 for the closing lecture of our 2025 Henry Cohen Lecture Series.

Speakers:

• Dorian Warren, Co-President, Community Change; Co-Founder, Economic Security Project
• Sara Nelson, President, Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, AFL-CIO
• April Verrett, President, SEIU
• Alicia Garza, Author, The Purpose of Power
• Fred Redmond, Secretary-Treasurer, AFL-CIO
• Darrick Hamilton, Founding Director, Institute on Race, Power and Political Economy; Chief Economist, AFL-CIO

This event is part of the 2025 Henry Cohen Lecture Series, which brings leading thinkers, changemakers, policymakers, journalists, and activists to The New School to present their perspectives and explore the intersections of race, social stratification, and political economy that inspire economic and racial justice. 

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Presented in partnership with the Institute on Race, Power and Political Economy and the Milano School of Policy, Management, and Environment at The New School.

EVENT RECAP

The Imperative of a Strong Labor Movement: Rebalancing Power and Advancing Economic Justice

By Madeline Neighly, Senior Strategist and Researcher

The final Henry Cohen Lecture of the semester brought together organizers, advocates, and economists in conversation about the future of the American labor movement and the stakes not only for economic justice but for democracy.

Dorian Warren opened the evening with a reflection on the echoes of history in today’s present, reminding us that collective remembrance itself is an act of resistance. He cautioned us there is no democracy without worker power, and no worker power without true solidarity. Quoting W.E.B. DuBois, Warren reminded us that labor split its own power when white workers chose racial exclusion over solidarity and urged a true solidarity as the necessary response to the moment.

Moderator Alicia Garza guided panelists April Verrett, Sara Nelson, and Darrick Hamilton through a sharp and urgent dialogue on identity, labor, and economic truth-telling. Verrett drew a straight line from 1619 to today with greed and white supremacy as cornerstones of economic exploitation. Nelson pushed us all to remember that reproductive justice inseparable from economic justice and noting that today’s labor wins come from an understanding of how gender, race, and class shape workplace power. Hamilton connected all of this in a diagnosis of an economy that has “naturalized poverty,” weaponizing relative status to sow division and perpetuate inequality.

The evening closed with a call to build not only worker power, but a new common sense. “Labor,” as Fred Redmond noted, “is not an institution outside of us–it is ours for the shaping.”