The Ten Commandments of Movement Solidarity

After a decade of grass­roots advo­ca­cy, my per­son­al belief is that the great­est obsta­cle to pos­i­tive change in the world isn’t cor­po­ra­tions, the gov­ern­ment, or the 1%, but lack of move­ment solidarity.

And no, I’m not pre­tend­ing to be some mod­ern day Moses bring­ing the divine truths down from the moun­tain. I’m just some­one who has par­tic­i­pat­ed in the entire spec­trum of the envi­ron­men­tal move­ment — from main­stream to “rad­i­cal,” on both coasts — who has wit­nessed a lot of unnec­es­sary fail­ures over the years, in large part because peo­ple can’t fig­ure out how to work together.

Since my work these days focus­es on the health and envi­ron­men­tal impacts of dirty ener­gy —  nuclear, fos­sil fuels, and biomass/trash incin­er­a­tion — most of the spe­cif­ic exam­ples I give in this arti­cle will come from that realm. How­ev­er, chances are the “Ten Com­mand­ments of Sol­i­dar­i­ty” can also apply to your move­ment, what­ev­er it is…unless it’s evil. In which case, it won’t, so don’t bother.

Now, I’ll admit that lim­it­ing this list to just ten points is arbi­trary, so if you’ve got oth­er “com­mand­ments,” please post them in the com­ments, where I’ll ignore them…Just kid­ding, I’ll read and care­ful­ly con­sid­er them, because that’s what sol­i­dar­i­ty looks like.

1. Thy move­ment shalt not have ambigu­ous goals

What­ev­er your move­ment, even if you can’t fig­ure out exact­ly what you want, you can almost guar­an­tee that your oppo­si­tion can. For instance, a cor­po­ra­tion that logs forests typ­i­cal­ly wants to cut down as many trees as it can and sell them for as high a prof­it as pos­si­ble, for as long as is fea­si­ble. Its goals are crys­tal freak­ing clear — unlike the streams it silts up in pur­suit of the dollar.

Unfor­tu­nate­ly, Big Timber’s coun­ter­part, the for­est pro­tec­tion move­ment, doesn’t have the same clar­i­ty of pur­pose. Instead of these orga­ni­za­tions band­ing togeth­er to achieve a con­crete goal, such as pass­ing a Con­gres­sion­al bill to pro­tect Nation­al Forests, they have split off on lit­er­al­ly hun­dreds of dif­fer­ent mis­sions under the ban­ner of for­est pro­tec­tion — includ­ing push­ing for more logging.

This isn’t to say that sim­ply declar­ing a spe­cif­ic goal, like ban­ning pri­vate land clearcut­ting, means it will hap­pen. In many cas­es, espe­cial­ly for some of the bold­er goals, it might nev­er. But what many — most? — for­est pro­tec­tion groups have done is thrown in the tow­el before they even set foot in the ring. While it’s true that you can fight the good fight and still get knocked out, you can damn well guar­an­tee defeat if you throw the fight before the bell is even rung.

In my opin­ion there’s one way, and one way only, to go about advo­ca­cy of any sort. And no one has explained it bet­ter than David Brow­er, the arch­druid him­self: “Our role is to hold fast to what we believe is right, to fight for it, to find allies, and to adduce all pos­si­ble argu­ments for our cause. If we can­not find enough vig­or in us or our friends to win, then let some­one else pro­pose the com­pro­mise, which we must then work hard to coax our way. We thus become a nucle­us around which activists can build and function.”

Suf­fice it to say, were Brow­er alive today, he’d have some, um, sug­ges­tions for the ever-shift­ing and seem­ing­ly arbi­trary goals of the 21^st century’s for­est pro­tec­tion movement.

2. Thou shalt not con­tra­dict move­ment goals

A move­ment is only as pow­er­ful as its mes­sage. In fact, mes­sag­ing is pret­ty much the only tool the grass­roots has to enact change. When speak­ing to the media, com­ment­ing on pol­i­cy, or protest­ing in the streets, make sure you aren’t advo­cat­ing for any­thing that would stand in the way of your move­ment reach­ing its ulti­mate goals.

For instance, if your orga­ni­za­tion oppos­es bio­mass pow­er plants because of their impacts on pub­lic health from air pol­lu­tion, you can’t sup­port slight­ly small­er and/or bare­ly more effi­cient bio­mass facil­i­ties with even less effec­tive pol­lu­tion con­trols with­out inval­i­dat­ing your main talk­ing point. 

Which isn’t to say that you can’t have your pri­or­i­ties straight and focus on the biggest, most con­spic­u­ous 50-megawatt facil­i­ties and not devote many resources to, say, oppos­ing a college’s 2‑megawatt com­bined-heat-and-pow­er facil­i­ty. But, actu­al­ly endors­ing one of these incin­er­a­tors not only con­tra­dicts your pub­lic health con­cerns, but makes the work of those in the move­ment who are fight­ing those facil­i­ties that much harder.

3. Thou shalt not con­fuse par­tial agree­ment with solidarity

It may seem easy to tell the dif­fer­ence between orga­ni­za­tions and indi­vid­u­als who sup­port your move­ment and those who do not, but it’s a com­mon mis­take with­in the grass­roots and a major rea­son for a giv­en movement’s seem­ing­ly inevitable fragmentation.

While it’d be nice to take the “big tent” approach and invite any­one claim­ing to be an ally into a piv­otal role in your move­ment, the real­i­ty is that’s one of the best ways to ensure its demise. On the sur­face, they may appear to sup­port all of your movement’s goals, but a deep­er look may reveal oth­er­wise. For instance, not every­one who oppos­es a par­tic­u­lar nuclear pow­er plant is nec­es­sar­i­ly against the entire con­cept of nuclear ener­gy. While they may share the anti-nuclear movement’s goal of shut­ting down one spe­cif­ic facil­i­ty, a clos­er look may reveal them to mere­ly be in favor of a more tech­no­log­i­cal­ly-advanced nuclear reactor. 

This isn’t to say you can’t have friend­ly and respect­ful work­ing rela­tion­ships with those enti­ties or indi­vid­u­als whose goals most­ly, or even par­tial­ly, over­lap. But you are set­ting your­self up for dis­ap­point­ment if you actu­al­ly expect them to have sol­i­dar­i­ty with your move­ment. A dif­fer­ence of opin­ion doesn’t always mean they are weak-willed or in the pock­et of indus­try, but it usu­al­ly does mean they are com­ing from a dif­fer­ent place, and there­fore it’s unlike­ly for any amount of sweet-talk­ing or brow-beat­ing to change their mind. Sol­i­dar­i­ty in the anti-nuke move­ment can only be achieved by those who are, well, anti-nuke. Oppos­ing one facil­i­ty while sup­port­ing anoth­er is still pro-nuke. 

Of course, if they do recon­sid­er their posi­tion, you can leave the past in the past and wel­come them with open arms. But let­ting them in before they recant just weak­ens the move­ment. The best way to achieve move­ment sol­i­dar­i­ty is by cre­at­ing it slow­ly but sure­ly, build­ing a strong foun­da­tion upon which to expand — instead of on shift­ing sands that can top­ple the entire structure. 

4. Thou shalt not side­step calls to action

If some­one in your move­ment has an ini­tia­tive, be it a ral­ly, a call-in day to elect­ed offi­cials, or even an online peti­tion, even if it’s not your favorite thing in the world, help them out with it at least a lit­tle bit. If you have con­struc­tive crit­i­cism to offer in regards to their project, or even have con­cerns that it doesn’t align with move­ment goals, then pri­vate­ly speak to them about the issue. But don’t shun them out of dis­agree­ment, or because it’s a bit of a has­sle, as that will only fos­ter hurt feel­ings, and be the begin­ning (or widen­ing) of a rift in the movement.

If you’re jazzed about the pro­pos­al, then of course, offer as much sup­port and resources as you can. But even if you’re luke­warm or just don’t have the means, it lit­er­al­ly only takes a few min­utes to spread the word via email or social media. Even if doing so doesn’t make or break the ini­tia­tive (it might), rest assured that your ally will make note of your sup­port, and keep your efforts in mind in the future.

This quid pro quo sup­port of orga­ni­za­tions is the cur­ren­cy of grass­roots move­ments. There­fore, the move­ment aside, it’s in your own best inter­est to make sure your credit’s good.

5. Thou shalt not respond emo­tion­al­ly to criticism

The only thing more impor­tant than crit­i­cism from inside a move­ment is how you respond to it. Whether it’s a well thought out, point-by-point refu­ta­tion or just a knee-jerk out­burst from some­one hav­ing a bad day, sit with the infor­ma­tion — not the tone — before respond­ing to it, so as to fil­ter out the hurt and/or anger.

No mat­ter what they’ve said, if they are a fel­low move­ment mem­ber, chances are it’s not impor­tant enough to ruin your work­ing rela­tion­ship over. Many times, in fact, it’s sim­ply a mis­un­der­stand­ing that can be cleared up quick­ly. But even if it’s not, respond­ing in anger will only make the sit­u­a­tion worse, guaranteed.

Crit­i­cism from out­side the move­ment is anoth­er mat­ter entire­ly, as in that case it’s com­ing from those who don’t share your mis­sion, such as a gas indus­try lack­ey beat­ing up on your anti-frack­ing stance. If it’s sim­ply ver­bal abuse with­out any spe­cif­ic points being addressed, then feel free to ignore it. But if there is actu­al­ly a coher­ent argu­ment, it can be seen as a sign of weak­ness to ignore it entire­ly, espe­cial­ly if it’s done on a pub­lic forum.

If you choose to respond to an exter­nal cri­tique, make cer­tain you do so calm­ly and with­out mal­ice, as you nev­er know who might be watch­ing the inter­ac­tion. Don’t think of it as an attack you need to defend your­self against, think of it as an oppor­tu­ni­ty to edu­cate the pub­lic on a par­tic­u­lar point, and a mod­el as how to respond to the opposition.

6. Thou shalt not ignore inter­nal conflicts

For those of us who have bought into the whole evo­lu­tion con­cept, we believe that mod­ern day humans are descend­ed from an ape ances­tor. And while the Great Apes fam­i­ly is gen­er­al­ly a social one, it is also one prone to fre­quent con­flict and strife. Typ­i­cal­ly, these con­flicts don’t end in blood­shed, but the dis­tur­bances are often enough to tear the social fabric.

In a move­ment, con­flicts will always come up, and how they are dealt with by oth­er mem­bers of the move­ment can often deter­mine how much of a prob­lem it will ulti­mate­ly become. If the con­flict is between indi­vid­u­als, it’s not always nec­es­sary to take a side, but it’s in the movement’s best inter­est for some­one to inter­vene before things get out of hand.

It’s easy to step aside as tem­pers flare and mud is slung by telling your­self it’s a per­son­al con­flict and not your place to get involved. But if there’s tur­moil inside your move­ment, guess what? You’re already involved. To decide not to act is tak­ing action — it’s decid­ing to allow the fight­ing to get worse.

7. Thou shalt not turn a blind eye to attacks

If the work or char­ac­ter of fel­low move­ment mem­bers is attacked from the out­side, you have a duty to come to their aid. This doesn’t mean you need to respond to neg­a­tiv­i­ty with more neg­a­tiv­i­ty, nor does it mean you have to defend every­thing this per­son has ever said or done, but at the very least get involved in the discussion.

One unpar­ried attack may sig­nal weak­ness to the oppo­si­tion which, like a preda­tor search­ing for the easy kill, might embold­en them enough to inten­si­fy the onslaught — and you just might be their next target. 

 8. Thou shalt not abuse thy power

Most of the inter­ac­tions between grass­roots move­ment mem­bers hap­pen on a lev­el play­ing field, where no one is real­ly in charge of any­one else. But, in the case of man­ag­ing some­one as an employ­ee or vol­un­teer, a pow­er dynam­ic comes into play.

The key thing is fair­ly obvi­ous: make the best use of your (prob­a­bly under­paid or unpaid) work­er by being a good boss or man­ag­er. This means being on top of your organization’s pri­or­i­ties and max­i­miz­ing the use of your worker’s time. Do your best to pro­vide clear direc­tion (which can include con­struc­tive crit­i­cism) while offer­ing sup­port, with­out bot­tle­neck­ing their work.

If you have a legit­i­mate and pro­fes­sion­al rea­son to fire this per­son, real­ize that there are very few peo­ple out there will­ing to devote them­selves to the often thank­less and under­com­pen­sat­ed (or uncom­pen­sat­ed) work of an advo­cate, and there­fore — unless you hon­est­ly believe the per­son does more harm than good — it’s your respon­si­bil­i­ty to the move­ment to help them land on their feet (think sev­er­ance pay and a rec­om­men­da­tion) so they can smooth­ly make the tran­si­tion to anoth­er role in the movement.

Non­prof­it work­ers burn out very quick­ly and a lot of it has to do with poor man­age­ment. If you’re not good at being in charge, there are many resources out there to help you learn how to get bet­ter. And if you’re not will­ing to improve, for the good of the move­ment, you might want to think about step­ping down, so some­one who can han­dle the respon­si­bil­i­ty can take the reins.

9. Thou shalt not align thy move­ment with a polit­i­cal party

One polit­i­cal par­ty may be more of an obvi­ous ally to your move­ment than anoth­er and it may be tempt­ing to hitch your­self to their wag­on. But while one par­ty may be more like­ly to sup­port your cause, such as the Demo­c­ra­t­ic Par­ty and the dirty ener­gy resis­tance, chances are there are many, many exam­ples of them harm­ing your cause, like the left’s sup­port for dirty biomass/trash incineration. 

The great­est risk of a move­ment back­ing a polit­i­cal par­ty or can­di­date is its dis­in­cli­na­tion to offer crit­i­cism when they do wrong. As we’ve seen with Pres­i­dent Barack Oba­ma, blind endorse­ment by the envi­ron­men­tal move­ment has result­ed in him tak­ing its sup­port for grant­ed and giv­en him the go ahead to start back­slid­ing on his promis­es in regards to cli­mate change.

Loud­ly and pub­licly applaud­ing a politician’s good vote or strong pol­i­cy should be encour­aged, so long as you’re also cri­tiquing the bad votes and weak policy.

10. Thou shalt not avoid per­son­al relationships

A move­ment isn’t just about a cause, like replac­ing indus­tri­al-scale dirty ener­gy with dis­trib­uted clean ener­gy, it’s about peo­ple. In our age of inter­net activism, it’s vital to take oppor­tu­ni­ties to con­nect with move­ment mem­bers as liv­ing, breath­ing crea­tures. Take some time to have some in-per­son meet­ings (if you’re far away from each oth­er, go to a con­fer­ence), share a meal or a bev­er­age, or go on a hike together.

Noth­ing bonds a move­ment togeth­er tighter than per­son­al rela­tion­ships — you’re much more like­ly to do what it takes to achieve sol­i­dar­i­ty with an actu­al human being you care about than a dis­em­bod­ied avatar on the oth­er side of a screen.