Power and candies

Invisible racism Power relations

Summary

In this activity participants are invited to distribute resources (candies) and explore to what extent the power to do so can exclude groups and on what criteria.

Materials

Candies (at least sixty)

Procedure

Part one

1. Explain to the participants that you have a surprise for them, but only people born between April and October will get it. Emphasise that you yourself were born in this period and that is how you know that this is the period when the best people were born. Ask participants born in this period to step forward. 2. Give one candy to everyone who stepped forward. Tell the participants that you have more candies left and they can decide how they will be allocated: either for everyone, or between those born between April and

October or even between those born in only one or two months (the smaller the group, the more candies each of their members will get). 3. If the group reallocates the candies in a way that some people will have two or more candies, tell them you can give them ten more candies and only people with two candies or more can participate in deciding how they are going to be distributed.

Part two

4. Ask participants with candies (or with two or more candies in case everyone has candies) to gather their candies together and form a circle between them to protect them. 5. Ask participants with no candles (or with less than two) how they would try to reach the candies in the protected circle. Encourage them to try.

Everyone should observe what strategies there are. Make sure you observe the groups’ safety and stop the exercise if it becomes violent.

6. After the candies in the circle are reached or enough attempts have been made, thank everyone and invite them to sit in a circle for debriefing.

Debriefing questions

• How do you feel? • How did you feel during the first round of candy distribution? Ask those who got candies and those who did not. • What and how did the group decide afterwards? • Who had the power to make decisions and to come up with rules everyone had to follow? • What was the criterion according to which some people received access to candies and decision-making and others did not? Was that a fair criterion? Why or why not? (If the group does not mention it, the facilitator can stress that the criterion did not depend on the will of a person – i.e. no one has control on the decision when they were born). • What were the strategies for reaching the candies in the second part of the exercise? Were there discontentment and aggressive behaviour? If so, were they justified and why? • If candies are a public resource and owning them – gives the possibility to participate in decision-making, is that fair? Is this how things look like in our society? Give examples. • How do we solve unjust situations and unjust rules? • What is the relation between power and racism in the exercise? What about society?