I have known Dan Leahy since my arrival in Olympia, 35 years ago. He has been a good friend, a wise and caring person whose advice and reflections I seek out. We taught political economy together at Evergreen on five different occasions, both to undergraduates and in the Master’s in Public Administration program. Dan was always prepared and had a profound effect on students by his in-depth and concrete political economic analysis of the local, national and global political economy. He consistently had extensive handouts that he distributed personally to each student. His mentoring, especially of students of working-class backgrounds, was exemplary. Unlike many faculty who teach political economy in the U.S., Dan made central the role of social movements in causing progressive social change and shared his experiences and strategic insights on effective organizing and taught connected skills such as fundraising and organizing marches.
In fall, 1987, shortly after I arrived, I accompanied Dan to a labor studies class he was teaching to workers in Grays Harbor. This class was a project of Dan’s and the Labor Center at Evergreen that Dan had founded and directed. Besides the high quality of Dan’s presentation and handouts, what stood out was Dan’s respect for the students, mainly middle-aged workers from Hoquiam and surrounding communities. Dan demonstrated his respect for these students by respectfully challenging them to deepen their political, economic, and historical analysis of their work, of the corporations they worked for and the existing political economic context. I remember how much this group of workers looked forward to this class and how seriously Dan took their comments and questions.
In fall, 1999, I was teaching the full-time two quarter, political economy and social movements, academic program with Dan Leahy and visiting faculty member, Cynthia Adcock. Usually, we focused on the U.S. in fall quarter and the global political economy including international economic institutions in the winter. Dan insightfully suggested that we switch the order to focus on the international political economy in the fall to prepare students for the World Trade Organization (WTO) ministerial which was scheduled in Seattle for late November and early December. Dan took the lead in organizing an outstanding weekend teach-in about a month before the planned protests on the WTO for both our class and the broader Northwest community. He took the lead in finding places in Seattle for our class to stay during the WTO ministerial and protests and provided, for our class of 75 students, a schedule of WTO sponsored events and of educational events and protests organized in response to the WTO. I was reminded during the opening day of the WTO how important the teach-in was as I saw young people who had attended the teach-in, argue knowledgeably with arrogant and elitist WTO delegates from the European Union and explain how destructive the WTO proposals were for workers and the environment, globally. A few protesters told me they prepared for these powerful street actions blocking delegates from entering the ministerial by reading the articles about the WTO from the binder Dan had carefully prepared. He also followed up the protests with a debriefing by participants in the protests at a packed Capitol theater in downtown Olympia that he had reserved.
In October 2022, I attended the three-day Trinational Coalition in Defense of Public Education in Oaxaca, Mexico. The genesis of this coalition was a conference of teachers and teachers’ unions, Dan organized in Olympia in 1993 about and against the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The coalition just had its 15th conference. About 200 delegates attended, mainly from Mexico, Canada and the U.S. but there were also delegates from Puerto Rico, Ecuador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica. This three-day conference was very well organized with a strong emphasis on furthering close collaboration between teachers and teachers’ unions, social movements and communities in support of public education. I was impressed by the coordinator of the conference, Maria de la Luz Arriaga. She was in the background, never promoting herself, warmly welcoming all attendees, and effectively coordinating the many parts of this three-day international conference. When I complimented Mari Luz on her role, she responded that she had learned how to coordinate this conference and many other aspects of this important coalition from her mentor, Dan Leahy. Dan has been a mentor to so many.
In appreciation, in solidarity, in friendship and with deep respect!
Peter Bohmer
