Strategies for Collective Action:
How to Make Change in Your Community
A MAJOR CHALLENGE which members of blighted communities face is a lack of concern from those in power. Members of blighted communities may lack the power and resources to influence government action.
However, if people work together with others in their communities, it is easier to get the government to respond to their needs than if they work alone as individuals.
In order to have their voices heard and their needs met, people need coordinate their efforts. First, people need to meet together in order to make plans and identify desired outcomes for their community. This includes setting defined goals for what they would like the government to do for them.
Coming together to create these goals may be difficult by itself. If bringing people together to talk about an issue it a problem on its own, try bringing the issue to the people instead. Do this by posting flyers or putting aside time for it in the schedule of a neighborhood watch meeting or small group service.
Next, people should identify the appropriate offices within the city government that would be able to address their needs and goals. For example, for help with housing blight, someone might contact the Birmingham Land Bank Authority, the Office of Community Development, or the Public Improvements and Beautification Committee.
The contact information for these offices can often be found on a city’s website. Most departments have a front desk at city hall to find information as well.
Sometimes, contacting the appropriate government office may be enough to achieve community goals. This often happens when problems have not been brought to the government’s attention yet, and all they needed to fix it was to know about it first. When this is not the case, and problems are serious or long-lasting, communities should consider coordinated efforts to make their voices heard.
These coordinated efforts may include writing to city council members, signing physical petitions, and coordinating demonstrations at city council meetings. Communities could also consider reaching out to news media to publicize their efforts.
When deciding which actions will be used and how intense they should be, communities should consider these three questions:
- How important is this problem to our community as a whole?
- How long has this problem existed without anyone fixing it?
- Has the government responded to our initial outreach?
These questions are important for making it clear why your community should come together rather than tackling an issue as an individual. They also help make sure the community builds up efforts gradually, rather than going all-in right from the start. After all, asking the government to answer the door doesn’t begin with knocking the door down.
Once a plan of attack is chosen, stick to it and get the word out. Whether it is a petition or a demonstration, the more members of the community who are on board the better. Governments have a hard time ignoring large groups of people sharing their voice, and it may attract more people to join the cause.
If the need continues to not be addressed, it is time to push further. The more action there is and the more intense it becomes, the more likely collective voices will be listened to.
Hopefully, the government will eventually reach out and announce a plan to address the issue. Make sure to keep up with it! Now that they are listening, ask that they keep the community updated on its progress, and continue to meet periodically to see if they are still working to fix it.
Once a community has used collective action to solve one problem, it will be easier to do it again in the future. Keep a log of how the process worked to use it for more success later.
Another means of using collective action to make sure a community’s voice is heard is to have the person listening be one of them. This means coming together to elect people they trust from across the street to be in the government offices important to them.
An election is no small thing, but local communities have a lot of power to choose who they want if they work hard to agree on what is most important to them.
Even if it’s only one person, getting a foot in the door is a good step in having community voices heard more easily and more often.
John Sadler