Position paper on organising

POSITION PAPER ON ORGANISING

DON'T PANIC – ORGANISE! 1

This position paper is drafted by Søren Warburg (Organising and Movement Lead, ActionAid Denmark and Andreas Grarup Nielsen (Organising Co-lead), YOA Team and Signe Borker Bjerre (Learning and Governance Specialist), Helle Joensen (Learning Specialist), Learning and Capacity Team in February/ March 2019. The draft has got considerable feedback through the “Learning Meeting on Organising” at TCDC in April 2019 that consisted of a broad range of AA SPA colleagues, partners, activists and GP staff.

Feedback has also been received from SPA focal points at the focal point meeting in Nairobi in April 2019.

COPENHAGEN, AUGUST 2019

PURPOSE OF THIS POSITION PAPER The purpose of this position paper is to define an overall guiding approach to organising1.

Specifically, the paper will focus on: ■■ What organising is, including its political rationale and connection to the DNA of ActionAid. ■■ Why we believe organising is important now.

■■ How the ActionAid countries within the Strategic Partnership Agreement2 (SPA) works with organising through its programmes, projects, Global Platforms, the larger federation and partners.

The paper will serve as a basis for the subsequent learning initiatives that will follow in 2019 and onward3. The target group for this position paper is colleagues in the ActionAid SPA countries, specific partners within ActionAid and other colleagues on the Global Platforms, People4Change advisors and inspirators.

WHAT IS ORGANISING? Organising is a strategy for shifting power. The constituency is the primary starting point not the cause or issue. The constituency is largely defined as a group of people with shared political interests and social motivations, as opposed to a target group which is a group of people a specific campaign is intended to reach and impact.

With Organising you would ask, who are my people, before you would ask, what is my issue. Organising is the continuous process of building people power.

People power built through collective actions, often specific rooted campaigns, that involves a constituency that has identified common problems and solutions to those problems. It is the process of supporting these communities, people’s organisations or social movements to be democratically governed and led by the constituency itself.

Organising is different from lobbying, service delivery and community development strategies, if understood in the classic sense of working with or for a given community4. Lobbying, service delivery etc. may however be part of the tactics of a concrete organising initiative if defined and initiated by the communities themselves as part of reaching their strategic goals. Organising is not always the right strategy to use and sometimes you need to use a variety of strategies to reach a goal or a desired shift in power and social outcome.

Organising almost always includes nonviolent direct actions as opposed to other strategies e.g. lobby strategies or service delivery.

FIVE PRINCIPLES Organising builds on long traditions within ActionAid International. It represents a further development of methods and approaches, that have always been a part of the DNA of ActionAid. In ActionAid, organising is also known as Rooted Campaigning, which is largely defined by five principles: 1. People organize themselves with a clear purpose and agenda to shift power.

2. They claim their rights in the process of rooted campaigning.

3. They build networks and alliances with others outside their communities to claim rights beyond their community.

4. They campaign for specific changes within a set timeframe and with concrete goals.

5. NGO’s and other powerful allies support the organising effort but they are not in the driver’s seat.

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Organising requires us, as NGO’s to be guided by the needs, visions and actions of the constituents and to recognise our own internal power structures and shift them in favour of the constituency.

But moreover, it requires us to have the courage to support the communities and movements that are analysing and challenging visible, hidden or invisible power through collective action. It poses the inherent organisational dilemma that if and when these active social movements, we are supporting, shakes power structures within their societies, they can become an organisational risk we need to mitigate. We see these risks as necessary and we understand the movements as a crucial disturbance to an unjust status quo.

Organising is a part of an established methodological toolbox containing concepts within ActionAid like empowerment, shifting power, generating alternatives, solidarity and rooted campaigning and is a part of a vision to create “acting communities” in a broader sense5. But because of the central role that organising plays in the ActionAid strategy it represents more than merely a tool. It is also a part of a larger shift in its organisational visions towards a greater focus on supporting social movements and a closer collaboration with grassroots organisations.

Organising is a way to highlight some of the values that for decades have defined ActionAid’s rootedness as an organisation. Values of standing in solidarity, supporting and working with the most marginalized people and allowing their voices to be

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heard. It is a critical part of the Theory of Change in our strategies and partnerships6 and in our collective SPA programme.

In October 2018 AAI Senior Leaders held a learning meeting and explored best practices and discussed how ActionAid can engage further with social movements and learn from them. Secretary General Adriano Campolina stressed the importance of ActionAid to consistently advance our knowledge and practice on organising and rooted campaigning. Advancement by transforming our existing rootedness, programming and campaigning, by linking local to national, and by bearing in mind the importance of agility, flexibility and adaptability. He argued for the SPA programme to be an engine for this transformation, due to its common focus on youth and organising, number of countries involved, and its funding scope and flexibility within the programme collective.

Although Organising is a continuation of and is embedded within ActionAid’s Human RightsBased Approach (HRBA), it also presents itself as an opportunity to build on and add to some of the elements we have worked with through the (HRBA) approach. We wish to build on and support the ongoing focus on community organising but have a particular interest in how to scale organising beyond community level. We consider organising as a logical next phase of our continued effort to build a progressive and people-powered rightsbased organisation.

WHY ORGANISING!?

Our motive for reinforcing Organising as a central element in ActionAid strategies and efforts in the years to come is three-fold: 1. Around the world fundamental human rights are increasingly challenged. The normative strength of the human rights declarations has weakened along with the institutions that are meant to uphold them, independent regional and national judiciaries7. Civil society accountability and advocacy strategies have limited power to address this.

There is a need for civil society to reconnect with building “people power”, enabling diverse forms of protests, direct action and civil resistance movements as complementary to the strategies currently in favour. Organising is an essential strategy in politicizing communities, NGO’s and the struggles in which we are embedded.

2. A central principle in our HRBA is the active agency of people living in poverty or in other ways marginalised from the decision-making that affect their lives. Much of this work is traditionally centred around our Local Rights Programmes and Reflection/Action methods.

The connection to the national level and beyond is where ActionAid’s ability to work in alliances and with social movements becomes critical.

But often ActionAid does organising at the local level and advocacy or lobby at the national and beyond (where we advocate on behalf of others)8.

ActionAid—and INGOs more generally—needs to increasingly stand side by side with, or, alternatively, leave the space for, social movements, its constituencies and allies.

3. Both nationally and internationally, ActionAid needs to be aware of its role when supporting marginalized communities and in the continuous efforts of building people power. As noted in the Senior Leadership Learning Meeting in October 2018, ActionAid must be consistently conscious about its power and privilege when working with social movements and local communities.

With human rights increasingly challenged and civic space shrinking, NGOs need to be even more attentive to the importance of the aspirations and needs of the people and communities we work with9. Further engagement with and support to people powered movements is critical as a complementary approach to long-term planned development strategies on specific issues. Organising is a critical strategy to sustain and grow pressure for progressive changes beyond NGOs.

THE HOW’S This section outlines four key elements of organising that are being promoted through the four How’s of the SPA being implemented in 12 AA countries, to bring us from the Theory of Change around organising with a strong focus on youth, towards the concrete actions and activities in ActionAid SPA partners projects and Programmes.

As the constituency is central to any meaningful effort of organising and rooted campaigning, the selection of the constituency is key. The choice of supporting a constituency should always be based on thorough analysis of power and the potential to shift power dynamics towards social justice for the constituency, and potentially beyond. It should be recognised that there is a political analysis behind why a given constituency has been selected by SPA partners, as well as a thoughtful and clear value proposition between all stakeholders.

ORGANISING AND YOUTH LEADERSHIP

DOCUMENTATION, RESEARCH, AND PROGRESSIVE ALTERNATIVES

COLLECTIVE ACTION, ADVOCACY AND CAMPAIGNING

STRATEGIC ALLIANCES AND NETWORKS

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BUILDING LEADERSHIP AADK together with SPA partners support young people’s agency and ability to affect the change they seek in and with their communities. Young people must have the opportunity to connect, share and develop collective agendas, which requires leadership skills and organisational capacity of their community groups, organisations, or movements. Of particular importance is the ability to support young women’s leadership and assertiveness through our feminist approach. We are, amongst others, inspired

by Marshall Ganz’s model of organising as a tangible method of attending local leadership with a focus on the strength of public narratives through one-on-one conversations, Gandhian tradition of nonviolent direct action and many others.

The Paulo Freire-inspired reflection-action approach is another central methodology in ActionAid and our pedagogy developed through the Global Platforms specifically in strengthening youth leadership and capacity in organising, as well as locally rooted traditions. We aim to support young people who are or aspire to become leaders and be the frontrunners in organising communities.

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PEOPLE-LED DOCUMENTATION, RESEARCH AND PROGRESSIVE ALTERNATIVES AADK and SPA partners support youth-led research that enables young people to establish a collective understanding and a credible voice and position. Young people analyze and document the challenges they witness in their communities and their consequences. Based on this, they build and present alternatives which are more socially, economically and politically just. We are inspired

by Robert Chambers’ participatory methodologies which encourage a given community to engage in analysing reasons for deprivation as well as the solutions to identified problems.

STRATEGIC ALLIANCES, NETWORKS AND MOVEMENTS For constituencies to scale up organising beyond the community level and to engage in collective action, they need to engage in alliances with other groups who come together to challenge power but are not necessarily living in poverty or exclusion themselves. This could be youth organisations and movements connecting rural and urban youth, poor and marginalized youth with youth outside poverty.

It is also crucial to establish strategic alliances and cooperation with progressive actors outside the traditional civil society sector. A key part of this is conducting power mapping and understanding which institutions are essential to work with/influence to achieve specific goals and change power relations. These links, networks and alliances are not only important to scale up organising, but also to mitigate the risks of individuals and small groups working with potentially politically sensitive matters. Where necessary, we will facilitate linkages to the people and communities we work with and to broader social movements, supporting people’s efforts to build power from below to transform their realities and act in solidarity with others.

COLLECTIVE ACTION AND CAMPAIGNING Advocacy and campaigning have a long tradition in ActionAid. Organising can provide a supplement to lobby and advocacy strategies as a strategy to build people power from below to enhance the effect and accountability towards the grassroots level, as well as building long lasting campaign efforts rooted in local contexts. In the coming years ActionAid will enhance its ability to support long term rooted campaigning, public mobilization, civil resistance and nonviolent direct action10. We will support constituencies to get the state to claim its responsibility as the primary duty bearer at all levels, and hold states accountable for respecting, protecting and fulfilling human rights in ways that are democratic, transparent and effective. We will challenge and transform the hidden power of financial institutions, elites and corporations that are increasingly influencing decision-making processes at all levels.

ActionAid Global Platforms already facilitate young people’s agency and ability to strategize and plan for collective action. In addition, many ActionAid affiliates have experience supporting movements like Activista and nonviolent action through our campaign and program approaches.

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MOVING FORWARD TOGETHER IN SOLIDARITY This Position Paper is an effort to gather ActionAid’s SPA-countries, partner organisations, social movements and activists around an ambitious agenda with the purpose of strengthening our common approaches and methods. This involves deep analysis of learning needs in regard to organising. We aim to build our capacity, share knowledge and develop new approaches and tools. During 2019 we aim to deliver relevant and high-quality learning products and services to the SPA partners, which will allow us to integrate organising as an approach and strategy in our continuous efforts to fight inequality. In 2020 we will ensure that the effectiveness of the approaches and tools developed are tested and qualified before being offered to the broader federation, where there will be the possibility of implementation support.

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APPROACHES, METHODS AND TOOLS (TO BE COLLECTED) The concrete knowledge, new approaches and tools for the specific HOW’s of organising will be collected and in the near future be found as annexes to this position paper relating to each of the HOW’s.

When further methods are developed, they will be added there.

ENDNOTES 1] In this paper, we use the terms organising and rooted campaigning interchangeably. We generally use the term organising, even though the AA strategy mostly uses Rooted Campaigning, because the word organising connects directly to many of the traditions of building people power that we draw on: ie the Gandhian tradition, community organizing in the US, the labor movement, etc.

2] The Strategic Partnership Agreement is a partnership between ActionAid Denmark and ActionAid International Myanmar, Bangladesh, Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Palestine, Nigeria and Jordan (Arab Regional Initiative) 3] This position paper is, as the title suggests, written on paper and not cut in stone, hence it should be seen as a living document changing over time as we get wiser. It also builds on some of the same reflections that is presented in the Programme and Policy Rationale written for especially the SPA cooperation.

4] ActionAids Human Rights Based Approach defines advocacy as: “the deliberate process of influencing the decisions of those who make policy. It is about engaging with power holders and influencing them to adopt our preferred solutions. Advocacy can be defined as “arguing in favour of an idea, cause or policy”.

It often involves a combination of policy work, lobbying and media interventions.” Organising may include people led policy or advocacy initiatives, but often focuses on building people power within communities and peoples led collective campaigning and direct action.

5] Action for Global Justice, ActionAid strategy 2028.

6] For ActionAid Denmark specifically it is a centerpiece of its ambition towards ”Building a Global Activist Organisation in the 21st century”, its 2017-2021 strategy and not least its Strategic Partnership Agreement with Danida (SPA).

7] See also CIVICUS State of Civil Society Report 2018: https://www.civicus.org/documents/reports-and-publications/SOCS/2018/socs-2018-overview_top-tentrends.pdf 8] There are good examples where ActionAid also do national organising, or advocacy mainly with the purpose of letting the most marginalized have their voices heard in spaces where ActionAid participate.

9] See also CIVICUS State of Civil Society Report 2018; https://www.civicus.org/documents/reports-and-publications/SOCS/2018/socs-2018-overview_top-tentrends.pdf 10] For more on Direct Action see Beautiful Trouble module on Direct Action here: https://beautifulrising.org/tool/direct-action.

For more on Strategic Nonviolence see Beautiful Trouble module here: https://beautifulrising.org/tool/strategic-nonviolence

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