MODELS OF ORGANIZING-

SOCIAL JUSTICE AND SOCIAL

CHANGE
Community Intervention- Spring 2020
Why Organize? Why Intervene?

■ Think on this for a moment. Write down some ideas.

■ Think about the words ‘organize’ and ‘intervention’. What comes to mind when you
think of each?

■ Can we organize without understanding the problem?

Shifting Sands

■ Social Justice- challenging and changing of structural and systemic injustice in which
certain groups are singled out for less favorable treatment and others are privileged.
Utopian view of the world.
■ Social justice is beyond the concept of ‘equality’
■ Necessity to link issues of injustice to privilege.
■ Modernist view of injustice is individual inferiority, ‘the Other’.
■ What motivates you to fight injustice?
– Self reflection- does your motivation impede or promote social justice?
Charity Discourse

■ Charity: ‘‘an openness and generosity to others, especially in the support of those in
need’’
■ Morality and the ‘right thing to do’
■ Historically, this discourse has supported social change through individual action.
■ Oftentimes implemented through religious institutions
■ Examples: slavery, child labor.
Critiquing Charity Discourse

■ Charity emphasis does not focus on underlying cause.

■ Focused on alleviating the needs of certain individuals.
■ Can be done ineffectively and even inhumanely.
■ Loss of dignity and powerless of people who are oppressed
■ Is frequently patronizing and paternalistic.
■ Does not address power.
Human Rights Discourse

■ Focus on human dignity and equal rights of individuals, a focus on projection, not
necessarily on the cause of injustice
■ Increasingly replacing chartable discourse in talking about social change.
■ Challenges the status quo.
■ Formal system and definitions through the United Nation’s Declaration on Human
Rights.
■ Examples: Disability advocacy, women’s suffrage movement
Analyzing and Critiquing the Human
Rights Discourse
■ Emphasis on personhood and basic rights, but the position of the powerful still remains
unchallenged.
■ While human rights are defined, they are not easy to enforce.
■ Emphasis on the people who need human rights and less emphasis on the responsibility
of states and systems.
■ From a global perspective, the discourse emphasizes that developing countries become
more like the west.
Almost unconsciously, we begin to think of justice for the
rich and human rights for the poor. Justice for the
corporate world, human rights for its victims. Justice for
Americans, human rights for Afghans and Iraqis. Justice
for the Indian upper castes, human rights for Dalits and
Adivasis (if that.) Justice for white Australians, human
rights for Aboriginals and immigrants (most times, not
even that). (Roy 2004)
Privilege Discourse

■ Places under the spotlight those who occupy places of power.

■ Challenges those with privilege to examine how holding on to that power continues the
system of injustice.
■ Privilege is the other side of oppression
■ Intersectionality- when different statuses intersect, forming more or less privilege.
■ Two characteristics of privilege.
– Unearned, ‘luck of the draw’
– Those with privilege will benefit no matter if they deny it, ignore it or disavow it.
Types of Privilege

■ White
■ Male
■ Cis gender
■ Able bodied
■ Northern hemisphere
■ Christian (in the United States)
■ Heterosexual
■ Socio economic
Privilege (cont)

■ Personal responsibility vs political responsibility

■ Author argues that the responsibility of the privileged is to do individual acts while
supporting policies that reduce oppression.
■ There is significant resistance to the acknowledgement of privilege by the dominant group.
■ Challenge for activists and organizers to tackle privilege while working to reduce
resistence.
– Empathy
– Education
– Assess worldview and position
More reading:
https://everydayfeminism.com/2014/09/
what-is-privilege/
https://www.racialequitytools.org/resou
rcefiles/mcintosh.pdf
https://www.thenewprogressive.net/ulti
mate-white-privilege-statistics/
https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5
58850fde4b0892e071e7960/t/5a7b4ea9
e2c483ccb42b9a73/1518030506168/Be
theBridge.pdf
(note: this article comes from a
Christian organization and has that
worldview)
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/b
log/feeling-our-way/201702/the-privile
ge-not-understanding-privilege
Theory of Justice

■ Social Psychology- study of social interactions

■ Justice has been a difficult concept to truly define.
■ Socially constructed
■ Perceived differently by different groups
■ Frequently understood as a social construction
Social Community Psychology of Justice

■ Recognizes the socially constructed, discursive nature of justice;

■ Locates justice within the appropriate sociohistorical cultural political milieu; and
■ Recognizes the particular importance of procedural fairness as mechanism for
enhancing collaboration and empowerment beyond the traditional focus on distribution
of resources
■ Instrumental vs relational- looking at the rule or process at hand vs understanding the
interconnectedness of the process and rule.
Procedural Justice
■ Procedural Justice- perceived fairness of the process in which decisions are made
■ Three relational concerns
– Standing- extent that the rights of people are protected
– Neutrality – extent that people believe that a level playing field has been
established.
– Trust- extent hat people have for authorities, benevolence of decision makers plays
a big part.
Criteria for Procedural Justice
■ Criteria for Procedural Justice (Lind and Tyler)
– Knowledge of procedures
– Consistency
– Voice
– Personal rights and dignity, ease of operation, shared values, fair decisions
■ Rules from Leventhal
– Consistency
– Bias suppression
– Accuracy of information
– Correctability
– Representativeness
– Ethnicality
Results and Implications

■ People are less concerned with long term relationships with decision makers as they are
the immediate consequences of the decision.
■ Procedural fairness was best displayed by trust.
■ Perceptions of fairness by the council were most closely related to standing.
■ When confronted with an unfavorable event, people focus more on the outcome and less
on the procedure.
■ The more unfair the outcome was perceived, the angrier people became.
■ The authors’ study concludes that it is important to both consider how individuals and
groups view the authority figures/decision makers and how they view the situation.
Roots to Power

■ Depth- How intensely members feel about an issue

■ Breadth- How widespread that concern is.
■ Consider both factors to determine how we choose issues to tackle.
■ Consider factors of how issues connect with the organization involved and the
organizers.
Roots to Power
■ There needs to be a balance between the needs of the community and the
overall organization.
■ Strategize- Cutting and Framing the Issue
■ Conducting an Analysis
Roots to Power

■ Take a few moments to review the example given in the textbook.

■ SWOT Analysis
– Strengths
– Weaknesses
– Opportunities
– Threats