Tools for dreaming and winning
Sending selfies from the Camp Wellstone training.
"Politics is not just about power and money games, politics can be about the improvement of people's lives, about lessening human suffering in our world and bringing about more peace and more justice."
– Senator Paul Wellstone
On October 26, 2002, I was standing in line at the credit union on USC’s campus. I was a sophomore in college, getting ready to pull money out for a road trip from Los Angeles to San Francisco to take part in an anti-war protest. The cataclysm of 9/11 was a year past, we had started a war in Afghanistan with no clear objective, the rumbling was serious about invading Iraq, and all this was happening in the context of mid-term elections.
Then, the TVs playing ads for introductory APR rates and campus updates flipped to a news clip announcing that Minnesota Senator Paul Wellstone, along with his wife, daughter, and staffers, had been killed in plane crash. I was stunned. I spent the ride up to San Francisco a little shell-shocked, but when we made it to the protest, that energy flipped. People had printed hundreds of signs with the photo of the late senator, and his name was chanted, and the rally – a manifestation of the will of the people, turned into a celebration of the life and values of this unlikely leader.
In the intervening years, we’ve had some progressive wins and losses, I’ve had some personal wins and losses, and my political and organizing work has taken a lot of different turns and iterations. Feeling compelled, in our current moment, and because I like learning and meeting new people, I spent last weekend at the Camp Wellstone training, working through their Grassroots Organizing curriculum. It was a fruitful, practical, and inspiring weekend, and I wanted to share some of the thoughts I have coming out of the experience.
“So you want to run for office? So what?”
In his opening remarks, Director, Public and Political Leadership Martín Diego Garcia mentioned this quote, something that an elected official he knows says to folks who say they want to run for office. “Leadership is a tool,” Garcia continued, “not a destination. What are you going to do with that tool?” The question of leadership is how the training opened, with exercises identifying different kinds of leadership. For the training, we used these frames:
Visionary leadership – leadership that sees the potential transformation
Strategy leadership – leadership around what we are doing, how the pieces fit together
Task leadership – leadership around getting done what needs to be done
Process leadership – leadership around inclusion, motivation, and engagement
Ethical leadership – leadership that puts our work in the context of justice and right
I tend to be a Strategic leader by nature, a Task leader by necessity, and a Process leader with some effort, and it was great to talk to others in the room to hear about their own balancing acts, how they use their staffing, communities, and complementary skills to get their work done. Garcia used a great example of his extended family making tamales together to get the whole picture across.
The conversation about how the styles play together also got me thinking about putting those styles into a visual system (because I’m a Strategy leader and visual thinker) so here’s how I see them working together:
You have to have vision, strategy, and tasks to get things done. If the process isn’t meaningful, the people won’t be there, and we need to have a clear, encompassing ethical framework for the whole thing to make any sense.
Everything is based in relationships and connections
This is the real thing. In their introduction to the Grassroots Organizing section, trainers Calvin Orr II and Matt Smriga said something that resonated, “I knew nothing about organizing, all I knew was people.” And that makes all the difference. If we are building people power, we have to know, listen to, and love the people. This means personal work dismantle defense mechanisms, privileges, and creating systems that allow people to be heard and participate.
What was most heartening about the weekend was the variety of people in the room who were also committed to making that openness and change. I, as a 34 year-old with a decade plus of work history, was in an interesting donut hole of attendees. There were many young campus organizers, which may be expected, but also a lot of older folks, getting into organizing for the first time, many with unions. It’s never to early or to late to get into the work of building up people, of building up yourself.
This focus on people is something that I know through much of my other work – you cannot make effective or moving theater, write profound words, or get a cross-sector arts partnership off the ground unless you understand people and their motivations. It’s also a good reminder to get out of the way of yourself having answers. In a recent episode of the Good One podcast, comedian John Mulaney recalls some advice that helped him be more effective as a comic. After trying some complex set-ups to a punchline, a more seasoned vet told him he was funny, but that “these people don’t have time for your cleverness.” Get to the point, be honest about why you’re there, if it’s to make a change or make someone laugh. Joy builds the movement, and we build joy together.
The tools are out there
Throughout the course of the weekend, there were a lot of moments of resonance for me in other parts of my life, or in other experiences that I’ve had that mirrored some of the instruction. But what was most practical, and useful, were Camp Wellstone’s tools to make change happen. Tools to effectively understand what your message is, and to listen to what your opposition is saying about you and about themselves. Tools for mapping out relationships and power, to vet goals and to set tactics to them. Tools for engaging volunteers and partners, setting expectations and being ready to adapt to the situations. Practical elements that can move big vague goals to big specific goals.
Because we need to win. The Wellstone triangle has leadership in the center, bounded by legs of Public Policy, Electoral Politics, and Community Organizing. When we organize around justice, inclusion, and equity, we expand the pool of resources, the voice of the people, and our total capacity of change. We have the resources of food and land to provide for people. Now is the time to be direct, honest, and to make that change happen. The tools are out there, the people are ready. As the late senator put it, "The future will not belong to those who sit on the sidelines. The future will not belong to the cynics. The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams."