Organizational Development

10 Tips for how the Climate Movement can Improve Experiences for Activists with Diverse Health Needs

There is a growing awareness of the urgent need to create activist spaces that are accessible, welcoming and provide material support for people with diverse health needs. But how can this actually be achieved? This resource summarizes the activists’ experiences, insights and recommendations that they shared in the interviews. Offer material support. Provide a diversity of actions for people to take part in. Normalize people coming in and out of movements as their needs and circumstances change. Have designated welcoming and support roles in groups to make sure every new member feels welcome.

Civil Resistance Against Climate Change

The Australian climate change movement is capitalizing on opportunities to create change by rapidly creating a multitude of flexible, grassroots groups which collectively engage in a multiplicity of diverse tactics and campaigns. These tactics include sharing information about climate change, building localized alternative social and economic structures, and obtaining climate change action commitments from organizations, as well as sustained, targeted civil resistance.

Info session for the Blueprint for MRXC Climate Coalitions training series

The Lab is planning a four-part training series based on our Blueprint for MRXC Climate Coalitions project. Our goal is to help the Lab community develop more durable, effective, and equitable coalitions to win the climate solutions we need. This series is open to advocates who want help setting up a coalition, are currently working in coalition, or just want to learn best-practices for their next coalition. Come to this info session to learn more about the timeline, scope, and design principles for this all-new training series!

 

Series breakdown

Building a Ladder of Engagement for Youth

Young people bring critical perspective, expertise, and energy to our movement spaces -- but traditional organizing and mobilizing structures can leave them feeling undervalued, tokenized, or burnt out. 

How do we design ladders of engagement that truly support youth leadership development within our climate organizing work?

Participants will leave this Lab training with:

• Evidence-insights into the challenges and opportunities of youth climate organizing

Info session for the Blueprint for MRXC Climate Coalitions training series

 

The Lab is planning a four-part training series based on our Blueprint for MRXC Climate Coalitions project. Our goal is to help the Lab community develop more durable, effective, and equitable coalitions to win the climate solutions we need. This series is open to advocates who want help setting up a coalition, are currently working in coalition, or just want to learn best-practices for their next coalition. Come to this info session to learn more about the timeline, scope, and design principles for this all-new training series!

Series breakdown:

Behind the scenes of Sunrise’s volunteer-led phone bank program

In the spring of 2020, Sunrise Movement had a goal of making 300,000 phonebank calls on six congressional primary races. Sunrise decided to create volunteer teams to manage other volunteers, liaise with campaigns, set goals, and develop strategy. The volunteer leaders of these teams took on a level of responsibility and autonomy typically reserved for staff. The team members took responsibility for setting goals, creating strategy and tactics, liaising with campaigns, and managing the work of thousands of other volunteers.

On the Frontlines of the Climate Emergency: Where Immigrants Meet Climate Change

Philanthropic investment at the nexus of the climate and immigrant justice movements would help build a healthy and collaborative ecosystem across movements. Moreover, it is both a moral and strategic priority. This kind of philanthropic investment can enable forward planning of safe pathways for people who lose their homes; protections and opportunities for workers and communities who are striving to build resilience; and the power to win and implement urgent, equitable, and effective responses to climate challenges. This report urges philanthropists to pursue three strategies.

Reflections: What Went Wrong with the Sunrise Movement

The Sunrise Movement has had successes but also experienced internal difficulties. This article, a personal reflection on Sunrise experience, argues that the energy and mobilization of the 2018-2020 years that led to a surge of youth joining the Sunrise Movement won’t be possible in the next four years unless a new organizational strategy is built in the youth climate left. This author organized with a local Sunrise “hub” and then joined national leadership teams. However, Sunrise internal politics were based on who you knew.

Replenishing trust: Civil society’s guide to reversing the trust deficit

Trust-building is actions aligned to values — it’s not just communicating about what matters, but doing it. Trust for institutions across society is declining. This growing trust deficit is a serious problem: It erodes a high-functioning pluralistic democracy, compromises public health and makes it impossible to solve collective problems like climate change. Trust doesn’t just happen. American civil society institutions have an important role to play in increasing trust — which is necessary to create the kind of world we all want to live in.

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