Suzanne Pharr’s Article: “Inside/Out: Democratic Participation and Economic Justice In Our Own Organizations”
February 28th, 2007 at 6:56 pm (Downloadable Tools!, Politics)
“Inside/Out” is an excellent article written by one of SONG’s founders. It can be used as a tool for groups and organizations to ask ourselves questions about how we are doing our work, and what our methods and processes mean for the work of building a movement.
inside-out-dem-participation-and-econ-justice-in-our-own-orgs.pdf
Open Letter to the Left and the AIDS Movement: Two ships passing on our winding way to a new dawn « AIDS and Social Justice said,
June 12th, 2010 at 8:56 am
[...] INCITE’s second book, The Revolution Will Not Be Funded: Beyond the Non-Profit Industrial Complex, sold out all copies at the Forum, and its panel by the same name filled up so quickly that organizers had to post a sign on the door saying, “Please do not open – Fire Hazard!”—and still people squeezed in. Southerners on New Ground (SONG, a multiracial LGBT/queer group) held a workshop where participants also discussed the limits of the 501c3 model (for example, competition for funding between community groups; letting funders set your agenda; allowing college graduates to serve as front lines in communities they know nothing about or are themselves gentrifying; big nonprofits setting movement goals; grassroots groups not being taken seriously; self-perpetuation being valued over service and honesty, etc.) and exciting new ways to do what SONG called “free organizing.” There were also “hybrid models,” with some aspects of both the 501c3 and the free, such as a working board of directors with no staff, or having members vote on organizational decisions and pay dues. (For questions to ask yourself and help stimulate more ideas, see http://www.southernersonnewground.org/?p=53) [...]