In the year since George Floyd was murdered, racial justice organizations across the country have been inundated with millions of dollars in donations and thousands of eager new activists. They have earned a prominent platform that puts them on the front lines of political and social battles.

Their influence has been immediate: A local organization helped St. Louis elect a Black woman as mayor for the first time. A longtime activist group in Louisville, Ky., oversaw what became a hub for protests over the police killing of Breonna Taylor. And in Chicago, activists have lobbied the city to fund a program that would dispatch paramedics, instead of police officers, to people experiencing mental health crises.

But the surge in attention has also brought greater scrutiny and exposed tensions and challenges within a movement that saw tremendous growth over the past year, much like other progressive groups such as the Women’s March, which saw three of its leaders step down amid controversy.


In a very public dispute, several chapters within the national organization known as the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation broke away, claiming that the group’s national leaders had failed to provide financial transparency or include the chapters in decision-making. And family members of some victims of police killings have openly criticized racial justice organizations, accusing them of raising money in their children’s names but not supporting the families and their work to make change. 


“I just feel like all these organizations that were made were made after someone had lost their loved one,” said Michael Brown Sr., who established his own foundation after his son, Michael, was fatally shot by a police officer in Ferguson, Mo., in 2014. “And they see that these parents are coming up with organizations already. They should be able to get on board and support these families that’s going through this.”


Since the police killing of Mr. Brown’s son led to a new wave of civil rights activism seven years ago, organizers of protests and marches have openly embraced a grass-roots philosophy. They have avoided individual leaders, seeking instead to build a movement by the people, for the people.

But the tensions playing out complicate the road ahead for the organizations that have sprouted from this movement, as their sway has only grown since Mr. Floyd was murdered by a Minneapolis police officer. In the weeks after his killing in May 2020, an estimated 15 million to 26 million people participated in about 4,700 demonstrations across America, accounting for the largest movement in the country’s history.

That growth has brought great visibility, but also difficult questions over how to sustain it and how to effect meaningful change, whether through donations to political campaigns, services to families or investments in Black communities — or all of the above.

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