Summarizing all my notes and learning from the book “People, Power, Change” by Marshall Ganz.

Public Narrative

Why me? Why us? Why now?

Everyones favorite part about politics, and what most people see it all as: Stories.

The reality is that people are far more likely to get with the program if they “get” you, the programmer.

You need to be able to tell a story of self that allows people to “get” you by sharing moments of Hurt (why you care) and moments of Hope (why you can) along with the Values motivating your response.

Recall moments shared with the audience of Hurt and Hope and how they were responded to in a way that expresses shared Values

Tell a story of accessing sources of courage to transform a moment of Disruptive Threat from a source of fear to an engaging challenge. Thoughtless Reaction into Mindful Response.

A narrative like this produces the capacity to respond conciously to loss, difference, domination, and change. AKA: The actions that cause outrage.

Mutually constructing individual and collective identities happens through coherent articulation of narrative moments.

  • Pragmatic: How
  • Narrative: Why

The Power of Stories

What stories have over lists to do’s and don’ts:

  • Plot: Disruption of norm, narrated response, resulting in outcome.
  • Character: someone who can be identified with; protagonist.
  • Moral: Experiential moral targeting head & heart with new lesson.

Origin Stories

Stories start from the beginning. Communicating values are best done with learning moments early in our life. They contain:

  • HURT: Where we learned to care
  • HOPE: Where we experienced our worth & value. Beginnings of life often contain relatable challenges which transiate well across demographics, reducing separation.

FRAMEWORK not FORMULA

Order of elements (Self, Us, Now) can be chopped and changed to suit the narrative. Elements told via story moments contain sub-elements: Challenge, Choice, Outcome, & Hope.

Awareness of story allows intentionality, skill, & learning.

Practical Example of stories

So far I have one example of trying to put this into practice

The First Treasurers report

Context

After both the state and federal elections in Australia party business had resumed. Before the elections I was made treasurer of my local branch.

I had not been treasurer of anything before. With the introduction of new finance laws, combined with the fact training had not been for many months due to suspension of party business, and our disorganisation as people were either burned out or on holidays, there was not much direction or clarity for my position at the time.

The only thing I knew how to do was log into the finance system and read out how much we had in our account ($207.73) and give the treasurers report, which amounts to reading that number out.

In order to give myself some direction, I decided to use that treasurers report to create a narrative following the above rules.

Making a narrative treasurers report

Content to communicate

I started by jotting down the content I needed to communicate, the what:

Finances –> Apologies –> Next Step

  • Finances: our current balance was $207.73, and I have just recieved training from party office about how to handle our money.
  • Apologies: I will be up north in Newman during the next meeting.
  • Next Step: I want to do some social events to learn how to handle money, and I want to talk to every member about what they want to see the branch do.

Example of drafting the narrative

I then broke each of these sections down into their own why me, why us, and why now each containing stories of Hurt and Hope

Example:

Next Step: Why me?
Last month, my car was broken into and my laptop was taken. This crushed my motivation and so I failed to make the promised branch calls before this meeting. Despite this, I was still afforded time to think about our branch stratefy and study. This interim I have found both the avenue for us to question the party, and the precise questions I want us to ask ourselves.

Next Step: Why us?
Geraldton needs locals pushing and contributing to our cause. Without the voices of trusted members in out community advocating for our beliefs we will fail as a branch, and further fail our electorate. Our jobs as believers in the cause is to find the respected members of our community, the aunty to everyone, the co-worker people trust and vent to, and ask them to represent out towns interests. If our branch is full of people who practice the principles and objectives of our party daily, the people that listen and make those around them heard, who try to raise everyone up, not just themselves, and understand the needs of the whole community, then achieving our goals will no longer be an uphill battle, but will become a mere matter of doing what we already do a little more strategically.

Bext Step: Why now?
Our movement is founded at the grassroots. We win elections so the collective hopes of our community can be delivered. With less members in our party, we will faill and lose our right to win. As a majority government party, if we use our power to deliver what Geraldton wants, by having trusted members in the branch advocating, then we won’t just win the seat, we will bring wins to the future of our home.

I did not look over or edit this yet. I just wrote down what came to my mind until I managed to communicate Hurt and Hope with me, us, and now as the subject.

You can tell given the long winded, comma riddled text that is the hallmark of how I write on the fly. I did this for every section I wanted to communicate.

With the apologies I talked about wanting to go back to Newman where I grew up and talk to labor supporters while there, and for finances I talked about wanting to act on my new training and organise events.

Refining the narrative

My next step was to try convert every part of the report into one paragraph each, rather than 3 paragraphs each. So I rewrote each one in a way that combined Me, Us, and Now into one single paragraph.
The next step was the longest, here is how it looked.

Next Step, Refined
Our movement is founded on large groups of people working together on solving our collective problems. To solve our issue of low participationUs I promised to call all brach memers, but my pain from having my car broken into deflated meMe and I failed this commitment. I was given time to reflect and study, instead, and am fully ready to commit with full confidenceMe in figuring out who we are and what we want. We need to act now if we want build the confidence of the community to help us win, and that starts by making a plan that includes all of us. After we have clear goals in mindUs & Now we can recruit people with out values who want to see those goals achieved and collaborate on tactics that achieve them. Without a clear idea of who we are and how we operate, we will continue to declineNow

Still a bit long-winded, but much more nicely compacted into a single coherent paragraph than the first version.

You can start to see that chopping and changing of order to suit the narrative now that things are getting mixed together. You have more Hurt concentrated at the front, with some Hope in the middle, and a final warning Hurt at the end.

This is just a treasurers report though, and the next step alone is a little bit long, let alone the addition of the apologies and finances which have also been given the same treatment.

Lets rewrite everything again to be even more condensed as our final report.

The final report

Apologies: My homesickness has led me to Newman this week. Newman is a large part of the Durack electorate with a strong Labor history but unique challenges. Personally, I want to catch up with my old friends there, but I also want to see how our supporters are doing there. I regret not doing this before the election, as our two active volunteers fell ill just before the day and we had no backups. The second best time to visit is now though, so that’s where I am.

Balance and Finances: Our balance is still $207.73. We can’t keep this stagnated when we know the opposition both out spend us and our only other campaign funds come from our widely spread party HQ. I’ve never been treasurer of anything before, But if we all practice our roles now, we will all have three years - or two diplomas worth - of experience to each draw from.

Next Step: Our movement is founded on collections of people collaborating solutions to our collective problems. Without this we will decline as a movement. We have fewer members than when I first joined, and participation of members barely meets quorum. I promised to change this by calling every branch member before this meeting. I failed this task. This month I was deflated after my car was broken into, and I lost enthusiasm for conversation. Instead I studied and reflected, considering exactly what questions to ask. I am now more confident and motivated to call each member before the next branch meeting. As a party in government, it’s our time to push for the fairer future. Step one is finding out who we are, and what we think will make Geraldton fairer. When this is clarified, step two will be working to recruit those who practice our values and bring them into the branch, collaborating on tactics to achieve our goals, and show what we can do together. Each time we do this, we can achieve bigger and bigger things, of which election victory will be one.

This, combined with a list of powers I have as treasurer, and questions I want to ask each member, were what I submitted for the next branch meeting. The ultimate end result gave purpose to my holiday, and a clear, motivational reason to work on the action that will push the party forward (Calling all members before the next meeting).

I did all this on pen and paper as it slows down my writing, forcing me to think about sentences as I write them rather than jot down the top of my head. Pen also forces me to rewrite entire paragraphs when revising rather than make edits, encouraging me to rewrite entire sentences rather than just edit existing ones.

Emotion, Values, Leadership

Decisions are based on value judgements which requires Emotional Information.

  • Some emotions enable intention, mindfulness, and urgency
  • some emotions inhibit intention, mindfulness, and agency.

Leaders goal is enabling others to be motivated enough by a disruption to result in action and make that action mindful not reactionary.

Emotion, even negatives like anxiety, breaks habit. Consistency bias “It’s always worked this way” and apathy “nothing we do works anyway” are disrupted by emotional shock.

EMOTION: MOTIVATES, BREAKS INERTIA, OVEROMES BIAS.

Urgency and Anger

The job of a leader in any movement is to activate people’s need for urgent and intentional action, even when there is no apparent urgency and no clear conscious action.

this is done by pointing out contradictions in shared assumptions on how the world is, agitation.

Urgency establishes priorities. The two types of urgency are:

  • URGENCY OF NEED: made when things are so bad that action is needed now
  • URGENCY OF OPPORTUNITY: Made with deadlines. when you need to do something by a certain time for it to have an effect.

Anger counters Apathy and inertia via outrage.

The world as it is rubbing up against the world as it should be.

Actions that cause outrage:

  • Domination
  • Discrimination
  • Bullying
  • Violation
  • Neglect

Regardless of how legitimate these actions appear to be, they will cause outrage.

Percieved destruction of values, moral traditions, and dignity are sources of anger that can motivate action

I have yet to really put these theories in action. If I do, I will add the example and how it went in practice here

Strategy and Tactics

“Power without love can never be just, but love without power can never achieve justice.” - Paul Tillich

Strategy = Have –> Need –> Want

This section is about Converting the resources you do have into the material that will get you what you want.

There are two aspects to this: Strategy and Tactics.

  • Strategy –> Theory of Change: How to get from uncertainty to the point of winning.
  • Tactics –> Art of Arrangement: Translating theory into action. Action is only tactical if it intends to achieve a strategy.

Rhythm

Rhythm is an important informer of how we strategize. How we harmonize the rhythms within and between ourselves, campaigns, and the world requires seeing both forests and trees.
Strategy gives us a good view of the forest, the big picture.
Tactics lets us learn the details, see the trees.

Thus to be effective at Strategizing, we need both intimate knowledge of the context and the capacity to put that context into context.

Learning to Strategize

The Question of POWER is Central.

Most important of all is understanding the power of the people

  • Their depth of commitment
  • Their Hope
  • Their readyness to sacrifice

Strategy only exists in Time. What makes things important depends on outside circumstances. Strategy also depends on how others react to it.
Ultimately, strategy is Dynamic.

  • When a context is fixed, we can use tools like Game Theory.
  • When a context is emergent, ambiguous, and contested, strategizing requires more flexible processes, Imagination.

Strategy responds to immediate or anticipated disruption. Stories provide emotional resources needed, Strategy provides the way to think up a solution to achieve the goal.

  • Storytelling = Why
  • Strategizing = How

All this requires who, when, and where we are. It requires specific resources, Specific Power.

TLDR: Strategy is Intentional, Motivated, Proactive, Creative, and Nested.

Nested Strategy

Resources --> Outcome --> Outcome's Resources --> Larger Outcome

We cannot make global change immediately. We need to use our starting resources to achieve small goals before using gained resources from that achievement to achieve bigger goals.

Example: if our big goal is to be carbon neutral by 2030, we can start by getting the local council to make a small commitment, say to open a tip shop.
The widsom and resources gained from that venture can then be used to push other cities to adopt climate friendly policies, and/or push the local government to implement even stronger policies.
With influence over multiple cities, you now have a statewide organisation that can achieve even bigger goals, such as endorsing and campaigning for a preferred candidate to bring your issues on the state and federal level.

Scale and scope does not impact the way strategizing is done. Goals both unimaginably large and significantly humble involve the same process.

Who, When, How: Strategizing.

Who

  • Who makes strategy matters. For good strategy to work, it needs to be doable by the people implementing it.

  • Strategizing requires a combo of insider and outsider perspectives

  • Strategizers need to be motivated individuals. Those disaffected with how things are think harder about how to change them.

  • Strategy uses teams. Teams of diversely connected people have higher creative potential.

How

Critically reflected assumptions –> Test with experience –> With evidence –> Others perceptions –> Internal contradictions

Clarity of facts requires agitation, and requires mutual respect within a trusted team, where different views can cause conflict.

When

Plan a target to start with, review at the halfway point, and reogranize at the endgame. Mostly action comes from response to others. After Action reports, too!

Strategy: The six Question

Used as an adaptable roadmap rather than a solid plan, strategic process can be framed by six questions.

  1. Who are my people?
  2. What is the change they want?
  3. What is their theory of change?
  4. What is their strategic goal?
  5. What tactics can we use?
  6. What is the timing?

Question 1: Who are my People?

Know who you fight for and ensure they fight for themselves. If people are benefitting themselves, they will use their resources more effectively.
Use their lived experience of the issue to frame the solution to the problem.
Who is the core constituence and who are the outside supporters?

Question 2: What change is Wanted?

What do people experience as The Problem? How do things change if we solve The Problem? Why isn’t it Solved? What does it take to Solve?

Sometimes wanted change is only part of needed change. Knowing for example that the issue is institutional racism, doesn’t fix things, but fighting against bus segregation is doable, and can lead to further reform.

Question 3: What is their theory of change?

How do those involved think change occurs? People might think different things will solve their problem, like more education, better data, harder work, etc.
We must have a good, mutual understanding of how change happens. A good theory to work towards is a “power” theory of change, which goes like:

  1. If we use our reources in a certain way…
  2. We can impact the needs of those who’s resources we want…
  3. This impact will be harder on them than denying those resources…
  4. We get the resources we need to win.

We can find who has the resources we need to win by making a “Power Map”

Power Map

Power Map

Power maps are used to visualise who has and needs resource from and for whom.

Make a guess about every relevant actor and what resource they have & need, along with their interests. Then, any observed interdependencies among actors. General groups to include are:

  • Constituency: The people who both feel the need for change and who have the resources that can help build that change.
  • Leadership: Part of constituency that forms the leadership, can be part of other circles too.
  • Opposition: Groups who don’t want the change, where there is a conflicting interest.
  • Allies and competitors: Are groups that may help or compete with a constituency and may need to be won over or lulled.
  • Legal System: Courts. Where does the law and its agents stand with the cause?
  • Media: Who has mass attention and what are their needs? Never do things for the press, simply make windows for them to observe.
The THREE Faces of Power

Who is benefitting, who is losing, how this fits into everything.

Question 4: What is their strategic Goal?

After Analysis, when a good theory of change is made, we make goals based on that theory.

Example: When looking at filling basic needs of workers like dignity and security, the resources could be found in themselves and addressed with actions like forming a credit union, but bigger issues like wages and conditions was in employers control. Employers needs was a stable workforce and profit. The workers control over their labour, and connections, which could be used to reduce stability and profit of employers via strikes and pushing boycots, until the cost of better wages and conditions is less than workers actions.

Strategic goals may emerge during another goal being actioned.

5 features of an effective strategic goal
  • focus what you have on a single outcome that enables greater outcomes (nested)
  • Makes use of constituents own inherent resources
  • Uses constituencies strength against oppositions weakness.
  • Visible, significant, and important enough to motivate
  • is contagious and can be emulated.

Strategic goals are critical parts of the story of NOW!

Question 5: What tactics can they use?

Tactics convert theories of change into activities.

Turning a list of activities into tactics involves assessing how effective they are in your strategy:

  • How it make the most of your own resources.
  • How well your constituency makes use of it.
  • ability to unify constituency and divide opposition.
  • How fun, motivating, and simple it is.

Examples: A march will make good use of resources, and calling it a pilgrimage will make it more appealing and motivating if the constituency is full of people of faith.

Many smaller activities can be organised simultaneously if they are assessed to integrate well into the overall strategy, that is what makes them tactics!

Question 6: What about timing?

Campaigns operate with Time as an Arrow.
Organisations operate with Time as a Cycle.

Campaigns internally are an arrow, but need to operate with Temporal Strategy, they need to work with the Rhythms of their contexts (seasons, work days, holidays, etc).

Momentum requires you to produce an action who’s reaction you know how to respond to. Initiative!
You must also ensure one action leads to the next, and doesn’t end until then.

Ensure you are always doing something, at a time when it matters, and in a way that lines up with the next action.

Action!

If you can't count it, it didn't happen!

Action Questions

You need to ask yourself what your specific goal is, why that goal is important, and what you can gleam from those numbers.
Ask why a result is considered good or bad, and find patterns in the whole. No guess, no estimate, conclusion. Elections are won with Votes, which are won by Commitments, which are won by learning every voters Story.
Head = Tactic
Heart = Strategy
Hands = Action

Resources

Good organiseing does NOT focus on fundraising and resources outside constituency, this corrupts the power of the people.
You must motivate people to commit to a shared purpose, turning into collective action, becoming power.

What is Action?

The mobilisation and deployment of resources

Examples include:

  • Voters in a ballot
  • People at a rally
  • Union Contract signed
  • Legislation passed
  • Houses Built

Resource Mobilization

The gathering of resources from mostly people

How resources are mobilised affects how they are deployed.

Resource Deployment

Spending or investing of resources

How resources are deployed affects how they can be mobilised.

Economic and Moral Resources

  • Economic Resources Deplete with use.
    • Like Money
  • Moral Resources Grow with use.
    • Like commitments.
    • Like Skills.

Action flowchart

Those fighting against the status quo have less economic and political resources, so they need to rely on commitments and skill.

Sourcing Resources

Beating the Opponent

The status quo has significantly more resources economically and politically than people who challenge it.
This is combatted by relying on people to build the resources needed to win, using people’s time, knowledge, skill, etc, to win using tactics that optimise for that.

You will fight bigger foes with bigger gold, use people and growth to beat them.

Outside Money

  • Sourcing money outside of your constituency needs to be considered.
    • Funds from Unions who are ideologically aligned with the people and enfranchising foundations ensure leaders and those with power over a movement are aligned with the constituency.
    • Funds from ultra-rich individuals or businesses without alignment with constituency gives power of the movement away from its purpose.

Focus on the constituency

There are multiple reasons to use the constituency for support.

  • Guaranteed alignment with goals
  • Develops capacity of constituency
    • Builds local leaders
    • Fosters Collaboration
    • Ensures mobilization
  • Prevents the trap of seeking Ownership over Citizenship.

Inside/Outside Constituency

Action flowchart