The 1963 Civil Rights victory in Birmingham, Alabama paved the way for the 1964 Civil Rights Act. In their latest article, published in Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, UMass Amherst Associate Professor of History Kevin Young and Yale University environmental social scientist Laura Thomas-Walters ask: What are the lessons from that monumental victory for today’s climate movement?

“We wanted to think more deeply about the concept of disruption with an eye toward being useful to the climate movement,” Young says. “Lessons from 1963 are often misunderstood.”