Great to see Steven Saxby and Chris Connelley featuring in a story from The Guardian about community organising.
Steven Saxby says his church joined in December to benefit from the network of organisations that Citizens UK engages with in the field of social action. He wants to help immigrants who have been in this country for years, but are paid below the minimum wage and have no permanent right to remain.
Chris Connelley came on the Citizens UK training course because he is a founder of Take Action for Seven Kings and has been campaigning against the closure of Goodmayes library. He has used the techniques taught to good effect:
"The threat to Goodmayes library has been lifted as Redbridge council has removed it from its cuts prospectus after the most massive local campaign – 5,000 signatures in three weeks. I used a number of the methods and ideas from the course. Our sense is that they worked and established powerful new relationships ... which we are all now resolved to build upon and strengthen."
Paul Trathen has said recently that he remains unconverted about Community Organising, liking the idea but being unsure that it resists becoming bullying. I'm reminded on the subtitle to my Dad's second book which was, A Study in Manipulative Inter-action on Behalf of a "Forgotten Community". As a community work pioneer in the UK, he was upfront about what he was doing and took some flack for his honesty in saying it. The reason it is necessary, however, is because the complex and sometimes arcane nature of local and national government processes mean that it is incredibly difficult for those who are already disadvantaged in society to have their voice heard. The idea of community organising, as I understand it, is to train people in understanding and using those processes for the benefit of the local community which does, inevitably mean a degree of confrontation and manipulation through those processes. This is, to my mind, an important element of challenging those who hold power.
The Seven Kings and Newbury Park Resident's Association campaign to resist the closure of the toilets in Seven Kings Park reaches its climax tonight as our Secretary, Audrey Shorer, and Membership Secretary, Mark Kennedy (who has organised the campaign), speak at the Council meeting where the budget (and its programme of cuts) are to be finalised.
The campaign, which has seen close to 1,000 signatures collected for its petition over five days, is featured in the current edition of the Ilford Recorder. Mark Kennedy has said: “The response we have had from the local community had been fantastic.”
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The Killers - Smile Like You Mean It.
2 comments:
I shall try to have a read of your dad's book, Jon.
It was interesting that - at last October's annual conference of the SRNet and CUF (Link Officers) - there was a very strong reaction AGAINST certain practices of CO.
...to be continued!
I wonder whether that reaction is, in part, based on the inevitability of conflict (albeit peaceful) which has to be part of community organising and community work generally because they are about empowering and advocating for those who have no power and doing so by challenging those who do have power. Dad was particularly strong on confronting those in power with the consequences of their decisions and actions; something which the powerful find incredibly difficult to face honestly. In the established Church, however, we tend (me included) to run with more mediational models of engaging with the powers that be and might therefore be threatened by the more confrontational stance of community organising together with, perhaps, also thinking that the confrontational can be less effective in its outcomes.
Just general thoughts - you've probably got specifics in mind as raised by those in the SR Network.
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