Still Acting Up: Philadelphia AIDS Activism into the Twenty-First Century

As ACT UP (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power) chapters were in decline nationwide during the late 1990s, the Philadelphia branch of the national group managed to remain vibrant. During the late 1990s and early 2000s, core members shifted the group’s identity by recruiting lower-income African Americans that constituted the “changing face of AIDS.” The changing membership coincided with an expanded focus that included many of the structural inequalities driving HIV prevalence in disenfranchised communities, such as mass incarceration, lack of affordable housing, and low access to highly effective but expensive HIV drugs. Members also joined forces with anti-globalization groups, protesting against American free trade policies in Africa and pressuring federal officials to allow countries in the developing world to manufacture generic versions of medications patented under United States law. Drawing on oral histories, archival sources, and print media, this paper considers why and how the members of ACT UP Philadelphia articulated their interests as an “anarchist, queer, intergenerational” organization that connected local issues to global inequalities.