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Movement Matters has supported the work and development of labor unions throughout our history - through direct contracts to help locals strengthen their internal systems, the development of strategic campaign plans, and anchoring labor-community coalitions. We have watched with enthusiasm as labor has seen a resurgence throughout the US in recent years. We have also worried at the lack of consistent practices in many unions to build deep and robust member-leadership, not only for issues on the shop floor, but to meet the broader political moment. Our long relationship with 1199SEIU has been a joyful and verdant one in which we have been able to help shape evolving mechanisms for building just this type of member-leadership. Members of 1199 staff have been attending Movement Matters trainings for years, allowing us to build a strong relationship of trust and a common understanding of decolonized popular education and base building. When 1199 staff recognized the need to engage their members in a better understanding of and context for the union’s call for a ceasefire in Gaza, they began to put into place a series of “teach-ins” to engage members around the issue. The Movement Matters team helped to equip 1199 staff with concrete ideas and coaching for how to facilitate these sessions and productively engage in values based conflict de-escalation. 1199’s instinct to use this moment to engage their members in critical reflection and learning is a great example of the steps that are needed to more fully engage labor in a broader movement building. 1199 organizers also recognize the need to more fully embed popular education practices throughout their member engagement. Movement Matters and 1199 organizers prepared an introductory popular education skill-building workshop as part of 1199’s staff convening in Philadelphia this summer. During this workshop, 1199 organizers were able to more deeply understand and discuss how to bring popular education principles into their regular meeting spaces with members. This was a first step in expanding an internal 1199 audience to the principles and practice learned in Movement Matters trainings. We are already planning for a new set of sessions with 1199 staff and members focused on the integration of healing and community care in their membership development practice. We look forward to continuing this relationship and this process, helping 1199 (among a host of other unions) to lead the way in building radical, transformational union organizing. Connect with us for more information about our Technical Assistance and Training work. Movement Matters is based in Washington, DC. We work regionally and with national partners. All too often in our base building and membership development work we focus on the doing, not the thinking. We rest in an assumption that people’s lived experience with oppression means that they have a detailed understanding of how and why it happens. We under-resource the necessary work of building a shared analysis and set of values to guide our vision and strategy for change. When we invest in leadership development, it is focused solely on “how” skills (how to do a one-on-one, how to speak to a decision-maker, how to develop an action), but very seldom on the “why” or “for what”. This type of orientation is understandable. Our members and our grant deadlines often demand a timetable that is oriented toward immediate action and doesn’t allow for “non-essential” work. Our organizations have limited capacity to do deep member engagement. And our ecosystem hasn’t created the institutions that can do this kind of popular education at scale. But even if it is understandable, it is not acceptable if we want to win in the long term. A lack of investment in robust and comprehensive member education builds weak movements. We at Movement Matters have lived by this sentiment. Organizing work (whether labor or community oriented) needs to be built on a robust foundation of not just member education, but popular education. We need to create strong systems where members are supported in examining their lived experiences and existing understandings of the world; where they are challenged to contextualize these experiences within a framework of history, race, politics, gender, and economics; and where they envision and embody systems that can create true alternatives to the racialized capitalism that is destroying our people and our planet. We continue to support our labor and community partners in building these kinds of spaces, ones that merge the thinking with the doing, to build for the long term. We greatly appreciate the author, Daniel Judt's call to remember this history, as well as their highlighting spaces where unions are reinvesting in these kinds of efforts. As we all learn and navigate the current political moment, grounding ourselves in what was and what should be is necessary. And investing in the popular education of our members is the foundation of the transformative organizing that we need. Connect with us for more information on our member development work and unique popular education approach. Movement Matters is based in Washington, DC. We work regionally and with national partners. The Rockefeller Foundation’s US Equity and Economic Opportunity team is beginning to fund worker organizing in four states. They have contracted Movement Matters to strengthen their understanding of how to support the work and to provide protocols and practices to best enter the field. As in our work with other funders, we grounded our process in a detailed understanding of organizing as a distinct change strategy, clarifying how it relates to and is different from other modes like service provision and policy advocacy. We have examined best practices to recognize and address funder-grantee power dynamics, especially when it comes to supporting grassroots efforts. We have also provided models for funder support of short and long term change strategies, and identified ways to shift philanthropic culture to be more responsive to the needs of organizations on the ground. We are excited to continue this partnership as the Rockefeller team begins to make grants and support the work. Connect with us for more information on our Funder Training and Technical Assistance work. Movement Matters is based in Washington, DC. We work regionally and with national partners. Movement Matters began offering Community Healing and Action Circles (CHACs) in the summer of 2020 with the recognition that community members leading campaigns to support and create change are lacking spaces to heal and grow together. Our first series of CHACs was developed for laid-off restaurant workers who continue to organize themselves as they fight for the rights of their families and communities. These community leaders asked for a space to mourn the current moment, to heal and deepen their resilience, to care for themselves and their bodies given their limited resources and access to nature, and to build their public speaking skills as community leaders at the forefront. We created spaces of radical joy, reflection, and trust building by using culture, expressive arts (including dance, movement and theater), breath work, self-massage, medicinal plants, ritual, story creation and story telling to center healing, self-care/self-regulation, resiliency, and the decolonizing of voice, microphones, and 'public speaking' in its entirety. Our current series includes: CHAC 1 & 2: Breath, Movement, & Voice CHAC 3 & 4: Movement, Resilience, & Story Creation CHAC 5 & 6: Our Healing Traditions & Self Care The Community Healing and Action Circles are intentionally structured to build resilience within a community context. Participants are not just isolated individuals, but leaders of change efforts who are deeply connected to their constituencies. We mindfully cultivate each session to meet the emerging needs of the work, campaigns, and the broader membership of participants, ensuring that healing and capacity building are being integrated into the larger organizing community. We partnered with the DC Urban Sustainability Administration and Washington Parks & People, and have been holding these live, COVID safe, physically-distanced sessions at the Columbia Heights Green garden. We thank the Junte Comunitario Virtual and its community leaders in Puerto Rico for providing us with the safest strategies for in-person sessions during COVID times. We have moved the sessions online for the winter. The CHACs are being developed in conjunction with our Learning and Action Circles and our Dismantling Anti-Blackness Among People of Color work, both of which are oriented toward organizers and professional staff. Connect with us for more information on our Community Healing and Action Circles.
Movement Matters is based in Washington, DC. We work regionally with various communities and with national partners. |
