Getting organized

On Sunday a group of people met at our church to watch "An Inconvenient Truth," the documentary on global warming. About 70 people showed up for the movie, and 40 stayed afterwards to discuss their reactions to the fil and possible local responses.

The solutions that were offered to cut our carbon emissions varied widely. One person wanted to leave notes on the windshields of cars left idling outside filling stations (suggesting they turn the car off!). Another wanted to question state subsidies for corn ethanol plants. A third wanted people to participate more thoughtfully in recycling programs. Every time people meet around a table to discuss solutions to global warming, there are many ideas and little consensus.

We invited people to come to at least one more meeting to dicuss how our congregation could craft responses to the implications of global warming. At least 20 indicated a willingness to do so. What is the best way to make use of this willingness? I've been reading about how to be an effective organizer and have yet to come to a good conclusion.

Here are some issues that affect the organizing task:

1. How do you find enough people who are willing to spend time to learn about the topic of global warming? What is the best vehicle and strategy for learning?

2. Is it best to keep working with people who already believe global warming is a serious problem, or is it important to start arousing the consciousness of those who are unaware of this issue?

3. How do you reach young people, who are so plugged into their Ipods and other forms of electronic communication that they are already overwhelmed and over-dosed on information?

4. What arouses people's self-interest around activism on global warming? It's all very well to say that we should worry about the polar bears, but most people need a more direct connection to the issue to understand why they should care.

5. Is the best strategy to find a worthwhile project combatting global warming, say planting trees, that allows people to create a connection to the topic through action?

I am going to be researching answers to these questions. In the meantime, I started re-reading a classic book from the 1970's, Rules for Radicals by Saul Alinsky. It is amazing how fresh and topical this work sounds 35 years after it was written. What I appreciate about Alinsky is how he manages to be pragmatic and optimistic at the same time. He regards organizing as a creative process, which is certainly part of its attraction for me.

Here are some of the quotes that seemed so fresh and prescient to me:
" As an organizer, I start from where the world is, as it is, not as I would like it to be."
"Dostoevski said that taking a new step is what people fear most. Any revolutionary change must be preceded by a passive, affirmative, non-challenging attitude toward change among the masses of our people. They must feel so frustrated, so defeated, so lost, so futureless in the prevailing system that they are willing to let go of the past and chance the future."
"...an organizer...is a political relativist. He accepts the late Justice Learned Hand's statement that "the mark of a free man is that ever-gnawing inner uncertainty as to where or not he is right."

According to Alinsky, the world is divided into 3 types of people: the Haves, who are dedicated to maintaining the status quo; the Have Nots, who are resigned and fatalistic, but have glowing embers of hope inside, and the Have-a-Little-Want Mores (i.e., the middle class), who are tepid and rooted in inertia, but nonetheless have been the source of the great change leaders of the past centuries. Alinsky cites Gandhi, Lenin, and Thomas Jefferson as some of the many change agents from this group.

The Haves are doing their best to ignore global warming. The Have Nots are too preoccupied with survival to pay much attention to it, but they will suffer the most when gas prices start to rise again, when electricity costs rise because of the need for more air conditioning, and when social systems of support get overwhelmed by the rising costs of obesity, and the health care impacts of global warming.

I will pass along two websites that seem to provide a good introductory overview to community organizing. The First is the Neighborhood Funders Group Toolbox on Organizing. The second that is particularly germaine to organizing around global warming, is the Citizen's Handbook, a community-building resource from Vancouver, British Colombia. An excellent resource for congregations interested in organizing around global warming is the Minnesota-based Congregations Caring for Creation, which has lots of excellent ideas and resources.