What's on top?
When I first plunged into full-time campaigning, I was swallowed whole. It wasn't too long before I experienced overwhelm... the compelling daily demands of recruiting, strategising, organising and reacting... I don't think I'm the only one to have had that experience!
My perspective shifted radically when I was given a book written by five Australian activists, inspired by their experiences during campaign to save the Franklin River. These campaigners - Claire, Harry, Linda, John and Gill - focused not just on the politics, strategy, tactics and ultimate success of the campaign, but also on the learning dimension. Of course! To save this precious river, ordinary people needed to learn so much, through political action. Campaigns and movements can't succeed with learning. The book had a profound impact on me and set me on a path that led to a PhD in activist education, co-founding the Change Agency and making a lifetime commitment to activist education.
In this month's enews, we're sharing Effective Action for Social Change: The Campaign to Save the Franklin River. You can now download the manual as three pdfs from our website. Many, many thanks to Linda and John for sharing this with our readers and your enduring commitment to movement building.
In other news, we're proud to announce that we've confirmed the cohort for next year's Community Organising Fellowship: 25 campaigners and organisers from right around Australia who will come together for three residential workshops during 2018 to build their campaign strategy toolkits, learn and apply new tools and ways of thinking, and form deep connections. They'll be our fifth cohort, joining a national network of almost 100 graduates who occupy key organising roles in many of Australia's most powerful campaigns and movements. Welcome, and congratulations.
Next year's priorities include an exciting project in Indonesia where we'll be helping to create a training program for community activists and developing a new suite of training resources in both English and Bahasa Indonesian.
If this is your first tCA enews, enjoy! Be sure to share links to resources, workshops and other learning opportunities with us for the next edition. Happy times, friends, and happy campaigning.
