Last week I attended the five day training on community organising put on by Citizens UK. It was a fascinating week with a range of people from churches, mosques, trade unions, charities and political parties. It was great to meet so many interesting people and learn with and from them. The training began with some lessons in the importance of power. We re-enacted the dialogue between the powerful Athenians and the less powerful Melians - which eventually led to a war followed by death or slavery for the Melians. We learnt that power in itself is neither good nor bad, but it's important to analyse and understand power - or you might end up like the Melians... We struggled a bit with the issue of power - particularly when we were asked, "Are you hungry for power?" This felt somehow 'dirty' but we were encouraged to think of 'power with' rather than 'power over'. In other words, it is important that power emerges out of relationships and common interests - which means that you first need to establish the self-interest of each person. What is it that they want? We then spent some time working on the concept of a one-to-one - a person to person conversation with the aim of discovering common interests and developing leaders. Citizens may be about communities and institutions, but it seems to me that the basis of citizens (and the reason why it works) is that it is based on real relationships between real people. If the course did nothing else it reminded us of this.  On Thursday morning we got to try an action out for ourselves, organising a mock meeting about a road junction. We only had forty minutes to prepare for this but I was impressed with the way we pulled together and made it happen - by following the Citizens methodology. You see, I think you could question the language, concepts and ideas that we were taught on the course but I think it is important to note that the model works and it achieves what it aims to do: it brings people together in mutually beneficial relationships; helps them to develop an agenda based on common interests; it gives them power because they work together and it has an impact on the decision-makers who control real resources. Thursday's mock action was a real high-point of the week for me because it demonstrated that ordinary people can make a difference by using a few simple tools. After the high-point of the two 'actions' we spent the final two days looking at the way that the methodology of community organising can be used to help build up local institutions. The argument from Citizens is that if a local alliance of institutions like churches, synagogues, mosques and trade-unions is to function well - then the institutions themselves need to be healthy. This means that Citizens UK needs to encourage and nurture the local institutions that are its members. We looked at a few tools and I think there are a lot of things that we could learn: Individual Meetings: One-to-Ones The heart of community organising is the idea of a face-to-face meeting to gain understanding of individuals, their concerns and their interests. These one-to-one meetings can lead to the discovery of shared interests and produce a working relationship that leads to more. One-to-ones are also necessary if you are to identify new leaders and grow the capacity of your organization. I don't think this is a new idea, and many of us have been working in this way for years - but it is worth reminding ourselves of the importance that these simple open-ended face-to-face meetings have. They are worth planning and setting time aside for. Training Again, if an organization is to grow, then the leaders need to set aside time (and money) to train more leaders. New leaders need to be identified, mentored, supported, challenged and encouraged. Once again, it is worth noting that there is nothing new here. It's what Jesus did - but in our busy bureaucratic church, it's easy to get caught up in tasks, projects and meetings. It's also all too easy to do things ourselves - rather than train other people - but training is essential if people (and institutions) are to grow. Know your institution and your neighbourhood On the five day course, we were often reminded of the need to map relationships, power and interests. It is clear than a good understanding of the relationships in your church and community is essential if you are to take action effectively. We often rush into action without thinking first, but it's important to know who has power to support or block a good idea. Jesus said something about only building a tower when you know you have enough resources to finish the job... This kind of mapping is very wise if you want to achieve something rather than merely talk... Action and Evaluation Another piece of good advice from the Citizens methodology is to start with the reactions that you want and work back from them. Rather than have vague hopes, it is better to have specific goals and design your action with these goals in mind. It's also important to spend time evaluating your action so that you can build unity and strength for the future - and improve. Having a goal that you can celebrate makes you feel positive about taking on another challenge. As a practical example of this methodology in action, the trainers told us about a church that they had worked with. This church used community organising tools to run a stewardship campaign. Firstly, a team of three were appointed. This team was trained and supported and then carried out one-to-ones with a larger group. This larger team was then trained to visit all the members of the church for one-to-one meetings at which stewardship was discussed. A specific target and time-scale was agreed, which was announced in church and then celebrated at its conclusion. The church raised the money it needed for a new building - and built a team of visitors who were keen to take on new tasks. This example of a stewardship campaign is fairly pertinent in Milton Keynes since a number of churches are thinking about stewardship at the moment. There are lessons here for us to learn... but not just about stewardship. We could use some of these simple tools offered by community organizing to achieve things that we may think are too difficult at the moment... I know that some people are still unsure about Citizens and think it may be a waste of time. I have to say that I am more convinced than ever that it's worth giving this a go. If we can get enough people together, we really could make a difference - and we will certainly learn a lot on the way - about each other - and about how to work more effectively as individuals and communities. |