Active Solidarity and Intersectional Organising

Perspectives on power and the privilege we bear are things often brought into and explored in our groups and organisational dynamics. We also need to think about them at a movement level, in building alliances and wider forms of collaboration. This training will offer a reflective space for exploring the challenges involved in this and beginning to design and develop approaches for responding to them.

There are no ready-made recipes for practising solidarity and intersectional organising effectively. The training is designed to create space for deep reflection, identifying challenges and unhelpful organising patterns and supporting participants to develop capacities for responding to each situation as it arises. This means being able to respond to the specifics of diverse movement building cultures in the ways that feel most empowering in the local context and with the communities and individuals involved. We aim to collectively create a courageous space, enabling us to step out of our comfort zones and what we already know, and enable critical reflection on movement practices and cultures, starting on a personal level and through to movement level.

We will explore how organising rooted in active and intentional solidarity can make our movements stronger and more resilient (rather than fragmented and conflict-riddled) and how we can practise intersectionality from a place of values alignment and vision for justice and joy, rather than a fear of making mistakes, shame and blame.

The training assumes a basic literacy with power and privilege themes. 

Key topics will include:

• Deepening our understanding of how the reproduction of harmful patterns takes place in our movements
• Applying a ‘skill sets’ framework to movement building, diagnosing and analysing problems
• Going beyond ‘intersectionality’ as a buzzword and exploring how we make it a real basis for organising
• Creating a basis for developing strategic approaches that push past surface-level inclusion toward deeper structural change
• Problematising the notion of allyship and solidarity
• Working on case studies to help us identify and analyse root causes of fragmentation and reproduction of oppression within social movements
• Strengthening the ability to act and strategise in ways that are most aligned with values rooted in solidarity.

Main methods and approaches:

• Participatory and popular education
• Working on case studies
• Movement mapping and context analysis
• Spaces for reflection and asking deeper questions
• Peer-to-peer support and learning
• Exploring, problematising and adapting models and existing methodologies.

Who is it aimed at?

Anyone involved in socially engaged action addressing ecological, political and social justice issues. We embrace a broad definition of activism, including: Resistance – action preventing further damage to ecosystems and social justice; Renewal – action focused on developing and creating alternatives for healthier societies and communities; and Building Resilience – action supporting increased resilience in communities to weather the uncertain times ahead.

You will need a basic literacy with power and privilege themes to be able to participate in this course, as well as experience in social movement participation. This course might not be suitable for those just starting their engagement with social movements.

The main spoken language on the course will be English.

For accessibility and venue information see <here>.