Power workshop (Launch report)

The Power and Politics workshop was put on by Mandy and Cath from IMPACT, a mainly faith-based Sheffield broad-based organisation, who campaign around a whole stack of local community issues.

They share an aim with the SSF, which is to empower people to take power back for themselves – where they can – and to help build protective networks for those too vulnerable to do so. (E.g. they campaign on empowerment, financial exclusion and the care and dignity of the elderly.)

We packed into a too-small room, and the first thing we did was this: get into groups of three, and try to write down the top ten most powerful people or organisations in the city. This was not easy!

After this, we wrote them all up on one big sheet (which is yet to make its way onto the WIKI).

Then Mandy picked some of them out, and ran through the ones IMPACT have come up with. It was a damn good list – one participant said how empowering it was to actually see the names written down.

IMPACT’s aim in doing this is so that we (us, ‘the people’) can go and either build relationships with, or harass, those people who actually have the power. (Rather than our democratically elected lot, who have some… but not a lot!)

This caused some controversy – most obviously from those who believe this amounts to nothing more than reformism, failing entirely to deal with the root problem of capitalism. My interpretation of Mandy’s response in the face of this (which was nothing more than a look) was – ‘tell that to the people we’re helping’.

OUTCOMES:

At some point, a list of all the people and organisations with power, with full profiles, what they do, where their money comes from, will go up on the WIKI.

In the future, I personally want to see a web site that can quickly show the connections between the most powerful people, and to have a connected guide to effective campaigning, lobbying and strategic non-violent direct action.

An enormously empowering workshop! Thank you IMPACT.