Grassroots Power Project believes structural transformation of our society is crucial. Stronger, more strategic community and labor organizing formations will help undo the damages of neoliberalism and racial capitalism.
We believe our movements must collectively shift from short-term strategies aimed at winning incremental change towards long-term strategies to win governing power. GPP works to facilitate a shift towards this strategic orientation with our community and labor partners.
GPP works with organizations, alliances and labor to develop new organizing practices to achieve transformational social change. Through decades of partnership with grassroots groups, we have developed a series of strategic frameworks. These tools support organizations to be more effective and ambitious. They facilitate a shift away from short-term, incremental campaigns and towards building and wielding governing power to achieve economic, racial, gender and environmental justice.
Our frameworks help organizations:
- Move away from short-term campaigns and towards the longer-term horizon that is necessary to achieve structural change by developing long-term agendas for structural transformation.
- Identify ways to build towards structural reforms that transfer wealth and power away from profiteers and into the hands of everyday people.
- Develop a deeper level of strategic alignment and a shared approach to power-building across organizations and geographies.
- Advance a multidimensional approach to building power, which includes base-building, movement infrastructure, ideology, and narrative, as core components to shaping a common political agenda.
- Move towards building a powerful political force that is based on multi-racial, cross-class solidarity – a “bigger we” – rooted in an analysis of racial capitalism.
GPP’s programs are based on three core methodologies: strategic education, organizational accompaniment, and building connective tissue between organizations.
We conduct strategic education with experienced organizers.
This integrates rigorous systems analysis with strategy to achieve transformational change. Our largest program, the Strategy College, reaches organizers across the country on an annual basis. We also tailor programs to specific organizations or movement sectors, such as our work in building the Feminist Organizing School.
We cultivate long-term partnerships with grassroots organizations.
Our approach is inspired by the Latin American social movement concept of accompaniment. We walk alongside organizations, accompanying them on the high-stakes journey of advancing social change. We co-develop vision, analysis, and shared practices through training, agenda design, coaching and organizational development support.
We build connections across organizations and alliances, which creates critical infrastructure for a strong social movement. We create space for cross-organizational dialogue and co-thinking that helps people expand their perspective, identify shared strategic questions, and align towards shared goals.