Local boards, national agendas: Mapping far-right networks in California education

• In Event: The Political Context of Education

Abstract

U.S. school districts and states have experienced a flurry of far-right actions in the past several years, placing new pressures on school and district leaders. In contrast to prior work that has examined far-right activities in the Southern U.S., which has historically been more conservative, in this paper we examine the nature of far-right movements in California, a state considered to be more progressive, yet with growing far-right activity. We draw on network ethnography to trace the networks of organizations working in California to advance a far-right policy agenda in education. We map the activities of organizations and the nature of their collaborations, identify and analyze central network actors in the field. We find a robust far-right network in California, composed of 490 actors. State and local actors were buoyed by their ties to prominent national actors. Many of the organizations we identified are new, founded in the past five years, which suggests the field is rapidly changing. These groups worked to advance state and local policy, especially around censorship and anti-trans issues, and to elect school board members supporting these views. State-level actors collaborated with national actors to gain legitimacy, or to co-author and promote ideas. Our analysis of a local school-board conflict illustrates how seemingly local politics is influenced by state and national far-right groups. We discuss the implications for school, district, and state educational leaders, and researchers.

Authors

• Huriya Jabbar, University of Southern California

• Danfeng Koon, University of San Francisco

• Michael Grigsby, University of Southern California

• Tara Blagg, University of Southern California

• Daniel Espinoza, University of Southern California

• Cecelia Jordan, University of Texas at Austin