Organization and Advocacy

While community organization usually results in political advocacy and while political advocacy usually requires organization, confusing the two can hurt both. Advocacy centers on policy. Organization centers on power. We can secure a victory on policy and lose one on extending power. And a failure on policy can lead to increased power towards even better outcomes.

Power is a political concept defined by Hannah Arendt as “the ability to act in concert.” The “in concert” is essential to the definition though often neglected by my organizer colleagues. They often say that there are two kinds of power: organized money and organized people. I disagree. Power is people acting together. People with money do indeed have influence and often finance the ability to seduce or coerce. But that is force not power. And people with money can support organizing. No one, not even the biggest, the brightest, the strongest, the richest, and even with the most authority, has power alone. True power is shared power.

When I was a young seminarian volunteering In Chicago’s Near West Side, I was mentored by a Catholic priest, Monsignor Jack Egan, who is still to me the ideal for a religious leader. Once, some poor black folk asked him to urge the alderman to make their garbage get picked up more regularly. They were not Catholic but they knew of the tight connection between the Catholic Church and Mayor Daley’s political machine. Father Egan told them, no, he would not intercede with the alderman on their behalf. But, he said, he would go with them to meet the alderman; but they had to demand as residents, voters, and taxpayers that the garbage be picked up regularly. And they had to persist acting if the alderman refused or didn’t follow through.

What Egan knew is that the real issue in the neighborhood was lack of power. If he solved problems for people, they stayed powerless. But if they organized on their own initiative and their own issues, they would have power and the respect that goes with it. Those who advocate for poor people usually leave them poorer—even if they get more services and income. To advocate means to call or speak for another. Organizing is challenging people to speak for themselves and to build their own institutions to negotiate with landlords, politicians, clergy, agencies, including partners and associates, with respect as equals.

Power for what, you ask. Sure, power for better conditions, lower rents, safety, and services. But political power, acting in concert, is its own end—the fulfilment of human dignity. Personal and political power can only be achieved by acting in concert with others, that is, participating in what Martin Luther King called the Beloved Community--a community with purpose and power, a community whose purpose is power.

The Gaithersburg Beloved Community Initiative (GBCI) situated at Asbury Methodist Village (AMV) is a free congregation of persons who are building their own ability to act in concert. The GBCI supports the building of beloved community at AMV and in the communities in which they walk, work, and worship. To promote the organization of the kids, parents, and teachers at local schools like South Lake Elementary and the residents in housing complexes like Cider Mill Apartments so they have the power to improve their housing, education, workplace, and other communities is why GBCI exists. Power is strengthened by relationships to supporting organizations and their leaders—city and county officials, the police, business and religious organizations, and other voluntary associations. And GBCI helps make those connections.

But the initiative and leadership stays with the people moving from powerlessness to power.

Community power is political and leads to policies, strategies for change that will improve a community’s institutions. But GBCI is nonpartisan and not involved in electoral politics. It will work with all who share its mission for the happiness of shared power, that is, the building of beloved community.

rollie smith 11-17-2017