Press conference in Philadelphia presenting petition signatures in favor of earned sick days

Labor and Independent Media Rise Up

Remember the Winter of 2011? On Valentine's Day, Republican Governor of Wisconsin Scott Walker introduced the "Wisconsin Budget Repair Bill", legislation that would put a $3.6 billion budget deficit on the backs of the state's 300,000 workers. What followed was the largest mass showing of public sector employees in recent history. Hundreds of thousands of workers, family members and neighbors encircled and occupied the capitol to show in support of collective bargaining rights in the first state of the union to make them law for public employees.

Note: Conservative frames that currently dominate the media environment have given rise to policies that hurt everyone. If you work for a justice centered organization you know this from living it. And you know how important the need is for effective and resourced communications strategies that compete for public and political support. That's why we're so excited to release Echoing Justice: Communications Strategies for Community Organizing in the 21st Century along with our allies. The report provides most comprehensive information on grassroots communications capacity and strategy to date. See the full report at http://centerformediajustice.org/echoing-justice/

One does not have to be familiar with the bolt sizes on the wrecking balls that tore down Cabrini-green to oppose the demolition of public housing. One must hold close the comfort of stepping into a warm room from a cold outdoors, the solace of a bed to lie in, and the security of a place called home.

We have become the expert biographers of our own demise. Rather than offering a vision of the world we yearn for, we study and share the machinations of government and capital that harm us. Like doctors who offer diagnoses but no cures, we are the town criers of a sick society rather than the midwives of the world to come.

A brief timeline of communications in the grassroots organizing sector since the year 2000.  

2000 -
Q: How many communicators does it take to screw the status quo?
A: Zero.  Communicators don’t screw the status quo, they screw us by taking money we could be spending on organizers.  

2003
Q: How many communicators does it take to screw the status quo?
A: 1/2.  If 1/2 of one person faxes out enough press releases, eventually the status quo will be screwed.

2007
Q: How many communicators does it take to screw the status quo?
A. One.  If one person does some magic framing and gets onto myspace/facebook/twitter, sooner or later the status quo will be screwed.

2010
Q: How many communicators does it take to screw the status quo?

A. One for every organization and alliance. To develop narratives, to lead with values, to get 1000+ facebook/twitter/instagram followers, and to screw the status quo!   2012

Last week, I had the great fortune of participating in a passionate discussion with a set of brilliant and effective leaders on what some call the "progressive project", in reference to the long-term goals and strategies of a broadly defined progressive movement. In the brightly lit meeting rooms of the Desmond Tutu Retreat Center in NY, a set of very smart people puzzled over the question many in the progressive movement have been asking for the last fifty years.

What will it take for us to win?

As we talked, a comrade of mine from the League of Young Voters announced that the more than 60 million dollars spent by Republicans on the Scott Walker campaign in Wisconsin resulted in 38% of union households voting for Walker, and therefore against their own self-interests- according to a June 5th article published in the NY Times. The big question on everyone's mind was why.

[Click here to read Karlos Gauna Schmieder's Response to Makani]

I had a conversation a few years back with an organizer from the organization formerly known as ACORN. Just a few days before, the 2005 living wage ballot measure in Albuquerque had lost by less than two percent of the vote. The organizer was expressing her frustration that funders were "getting caught up" in resourcing communications strategies to mobilize mainstream audiences in response to the fact that the Albuquerque campaign was the first effort where opposition put money into media, testing a message that framed living wage as anti choice and impinging on workplace freedom. The media, in her analysis, was effective with the opposition but the coalition’s base of supporters was solid and the actual majority. They would have won, she believed, if they had resources for a few more organizers to get their folk to the polls.

“It is part of our task as revolutionary people, people who want deep-rooted, radical change, to be as whole as it is possible for us to be.” – Aurora Levins-Morales

What if our movements made up one body – a living, breathing, loving thing – a healthy body that had the means to act and to communicate as a powerful, present and self-actualized whole?

And what if that body was made up of thousands of diverse parts distinct in their origins and functions, each with unique roles, but all fueled by connective systems that brought lifeblood, health, energy and spirit to the whole?

Welcome back to Fast Forum!  We pick a hot topic and ask 3 – 6 organizers from across the country to weigh in. Our hope is to draw out new ideas and to encourage new voices to take a stab at the freshest challenges facing our community. This month, Joseph Phelan, one of our editors here at Organizing Upgrade, pulled together a FastForum exploring the intersection of strategic communications and left organizing.

As we reflect on Organizing Upgrade's one-year anniversary, Left Turn is celebrating ten years since it first launched as a much-needed magazine for the emergent social movements of our time. Organizing Upgrade is excited to share this reflective piece written by two members of the editorial collective of Left Turn magazine, Max Uhlenbeck and Rami El-Amine.