ORGANIZING: Fundamental Principles of Direct Action Organizing

HIC

The essence of Direct Action Organizing is that it focuses on building organizations to be sustainable and be around for the long-haul. This is done by focusing on the power of individuals to improve their own lives and act collectively to win victories for themselves and their communities by altering the relations of power.



Fundamental Principles of Direct Action Organizing

• Win concrete improvements in people’s lives.

• Make people aware of their own power (by winning victories).

• Alter the relations of power between people, the government, and other institutions by building strong permanent local, state, national and international organizations.



Win concrete improvements in people’s lives.

We all have ideas about how society could be better in the future, but when we say “win improvements”, we mean today, here and now concrete improvements, ensuring the provision of drinkable water, getting governments to provide universal health care, forcing the city to build affordable housing, or requiring utilities to produce energy from such renewable sources as wind and sun.



Make people aware of their own power (by winning victories).

When we say that we want to give people “a sense of their own power”, we mean that people themselves are involved in winning the issue. If an advocate goes out and speaks for you, or if a lawyer sues for you, you get a sense of the power of the advocate or the lawyer, but not of your own power. Direct Action Organizing brings people directly into the situation in large numbers so that they know that they won.



Why does it matter? Because people who develop a sense of their organized power are more likely to stay active and take on larger issues.



Alter the relations of power between people, the government, and other institutions by building strong permanent local, state, national and international organizations.


When we say that we want to “alter the relations of power”, we mean building organizations that those in power, at all levels of government, will always have to worry about. Whenever they decide to do anything that has an impact on your group, they are going to have to say “wait a minute”, how will that organization react to this? We also know from sad experience that what is won this year can be taken away next year if the organization that won it disappears or is weakened. In Direct Action Organizing, building an organization is always as important as winning a particular issue.



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