I Know What It Feels Like to Be Governed and to Be Left Out
I didn’t grow up with policy memos or white papers. I grew up on the streets of Los Angeles, raised by a working-poor Black mother, in neighborhoods where “governance” didn’t feel like a system. It felt like a shadow. It was the school that searched your lockers before and during class but didn’t teach you how to write a résumé. It was the cop car parked on the corner not to protect you, but to remind you who wasn’t in charge.
That was governance, too. Just not the kind we name in mission statements.
I’ve carried those memories with me into every space I’ve worked since including civil rights tables, racial justice campaigns, union halls, boardrooms, policy shops.
And I’ve come to believe that the single most important question we can ask about governance isn’t, “What is it?”
It’s: Who gets to belong inside it?
Governance isn’t neutral. It never has been. It is the architecture of belonging and exclusion. In the United States, race is the primary tool for deciding who belongs inside that architecture.
Inclusive governance is the difference between systems that uphold democracy and exclusive systems that disappear and disempower people. Between a city that funds housing and one that funds police raids. Between an institution that protects memory and one that protects monopoly.
And right now, in this country, governance is under assault.
We are witnessing a full-scale attempt to collapse the civic floor beneath our feet: state takeovers of school boards, elected officials stripped of power, prosecutors removed for doing their jobs, librarians harassed out of their roles, data scientists sued into silence, and public educators criminalized for teaching the truth. This isn't a policy disagreement. It’s strategic sabotage, coordinated against institutions and communities.
This is racialized authoritarianism, and it is aimed at collapsing public faith in our public institutions and the very idea that government belongs to the people. The goal is to erode the consent of the people and then use distrust to concentrate power. We have seen this before. Whenever multiracial democracy expands, backlash follows.
So, when we talk about racial justice governance, let’s not talk about it like it’s a theory. Let’s talk about it like it’s a fight. Because that’s what it is. I remember sitting in a planning meeting a few years back—bright folks, beautiful language, a shared commitment to equity. But as we discussed who would be “consulted,” I asked quietly, “And who decides?” The silence was honest. And terrifying. That’s governance in action. When we confuse being heard with having power, we lose both. We can’t afford that confusion. Not now. Not with what’s coming. Not with what’s already here.
The good news is the same place trust gets destroyed is also where trust can be rebuilt. Close to home. In the decisions that shape people’s lives. In shared decision-making. I’ve spent the past few years thinking about what racial justice governance should look like as not only a framework, but as a felt experience. And here’s what I’ve learned:
It must center real power. Not just inclusion. Not just consultation. Co-governance is how we rebuild legitimacy. People trust what they have a hand in building. Governance is about who gets to say yes, who gets to say no, and who doesn’t have to explain why. If we aren’t transferring power, we’re not transforming anything.
It must be lived, not just imagined. Governance isn’t an idea. It’s a practice. It’s policy, yes plus participation. It’s not just federal or state; it’s hyperlocal. It’s also what gets funded, who gets protected, who gets punished, and who gets written out of the practice entirely. Governance is always being shaped by struggle. It’s not static. It’s not safe. It’s not protected by good intentions and must be defended. Daily.
Over the last two decades, I’ve noticed inside our own social and economic justice movements among those of us who’ve been or are closest to harm. There’s a growing instinct to separate “governance” from “government.” And I get it. For many of us, government has meant surveillance, exclusion, underfunding, criminalization, or just being ignored. I understand the instinct to retreat, to build outside the frame, to protect what we can without asking permission.
But rhetoric must match reality and we must be honest that there’s little difference between government and governance. Regardless of our comfortability with the word, if we walk away from governance of government, we walk away from power.
Governance is the only thing that’s ever-protected social change wins. When we won voting rights, passed civil rights legislation, or integrated public services, that wasn’t just protest but also the ability to reshape the governance of government. That was us deciding what dignity looks like, codifying it into policy, and defending it when it comes under attack at scale.
Government is what movements build when they govern to scale. Mutual aid? Governance. Building a co-op? Governance. Shifting school curriculum? Governance. How do we turn that governance into permanence and scale? Government. If we don’t govern over government, someone else will and often, they already are.
Some folks think walking away from government is radical. But I think radical is building a city budget that funds public joy. Radical is redesigning safety from the ground up. Radical is making public institutions answer to the communities they’ve harmed and ignored. That’s governance at scale. And we don’t get there by opting out. We get there by leaning in. That’s the non-performative work of governance.
If we only mobilize government and never claim it, we’re fighting without tools. We end up reactive, fragmented, and tired. But governance of scale gives us staying power. It’s how we move from protest to protection, from vision to implementation. And if we don’t invest in it, we abandon the very communities we claim to fight for. Our ancestors didn’t fight for scrap. They fought for self-determination. That’s governance. They didn’t just resist systems. They built new ones. Sustained breakfast programs, free public transportation, and health clinics? That’s called government.
We don’t sneak away from that legacy. We walk deeper into it. We’ve done this before. I’ve seen Black churches govern dignity. I’ve seen queer and trans organizers govern sanctuary. I’ve seen immigrants govern care through mutual aid. I’ve seen punk and hip-hop scenes govern belonging, when the state wouldn’t.
We already have governing traditions that date back generations. They are just not always the ones we’re taught to honor. Because governance is not just how we run things. It’s how we claim both governance and government. Why? To protect space so that it becomes something more.
It’s not given. It’s not neutral. It’s not finished. It is a practice. It is a battleground. It is a love letter to those who never stopped showing up to build. So let me say it clearly before it’s too late. If we are serious about racial justice, we cannot afford to treat governance of government like a side conversation. It is the main event. And we better be ready to fight for it.
