Encapsulation occurs when a movement organization develops an ideology or structure that interferes with efforts to recruit members or raise demands. …members may develop such strong cohesion among themselves that outsiders become unwelcome. In prolonged interaction, a group may develop an ideology that is internally coherent but virtually unintelligible to recruits and outsiders who do not share all of the members’ assumptions. Such groups are not uncommon in movements; they constitute the fringe of organizations that appears strange to outsiders. An encapsulated organization may find it easy to maintain its dedicated core of members, whose identities are linked to the group and who may have few outside contacts, but such groups have little chance of growing or increasing their influence. Most strikingly, they may lose interest in such things, contenting themselves with maintaining their encapsulated existence.

[Frederick D. Miller. The End of SDS and the Emergence of the Weatherman: Demise through Success. Jo Freeman and Victoria Johnson, editors. Waves of Protest: Social Movements Since the Sixties (Rowman and Littlefield, 1999)]

This quote comes from a rather good article on a blog called “Devoke the Apocalypse,” which is well worth a look.

If people want to get involved in a possible second stage, they’re very welcome.  Email endingactivism@gmail.com

“Aggressively confrontational” or “beautifully confrontational” – either one will do, eh

After a few conversations I’ve been having recently, and considering I haven’t written anything worth reading in a while I have been thinking about power dynamics and politics. This is probably gonna end up as a splurge, but…

In anarcho scenes there is always going to be a certain drive and energy (at meetings, and from certain people) at the start of a campaign that ends up being less than it could be if there was a concerted, equal effort from all fronts.. Anarchists are notoriously and infamously disorganised in some areas, yet one of the key tenets of anarchist politics is local and community organisation. It’s often hard to reconcile the two. In my experience, Norwich anarchists seem to argue less than factionalists in the London scene. But then again, the anarchist scene in Norwich consists of a very few crustie punks, students and enlightened individuals – in a small pond, it doesn’t pay to rip apart someone else’s politics with a serrated tongue.You can’t get away with it. Socialists are reputedly the platformists, the break-aways, the the pedants.. One hundred million divisions varying on how one interprets the wording of the 3rd International or platform 43.

Scenesters and politicos need to recognise these dynamics-they are failings and impediments to a functioning movement that actually achieves change for the better. People disagree. Standard. But those disagreements don’t need to be made personal, nor should they get in the way of meaningful collaboration and solidarity.

Of course there are alternatives to the approaches seen in meetings – democratic voting systems – you don’t like it, you abstain; consensus – wavy hands, you don’t like it, you pretend you do – but I have yet to see a way of discussing methods, tactics, ideas, whatever, in a way that effectively eradicates the inherent power play between and among individuals.

Advocates of consensus often centre a lot of their argument around the notion that consensus eliminates hierarchy – everyone is involved. But people who are new to the method will inevitably be intimidated by their lack of understanding of the way things work, and even as they become more comfortable with how it works, they may not necessarily feel able to voice their opinions. This happens especially if there are people who are more vocal in meetings because they have done more in preparation, or are more confident about speaking, or have simply been in the movement for longer, and therefore feel some kind of ‘core crew superiority complex’. In essence, there is always power in a group of people. Some people feel an entitlement because they have dedicated more time to working on something, and have been to every 4 hour meeting in a SOAS room throughout the process, and feel like they need some kind of recognition for their hard work (of course we do need to recognise hard work, but that doesn’t translate to lauding someone as better, nor valuing that contribution more highly than any other).

It is important to recognise the importance of everyone’s contribution, and this doesn’t always happen – people who can’t always devote all their time are often marginalised and made to feel less valuable. And this comes back to the class issue – middle class people tend to have more time on their hands to do these tasks – they don’t have to hold down a 10-hour-a-day, 6-day-a-week job for minimum wage on top of doing all the other things they have to do, and having a life. Cos that’s important too. And that further pushes people who aren’t middle class out. And then people complain about the ‘movement’ (especially the climate movement, although that is arguably non-existant right now – i would argue that it is simply dormant, having been subsumed into other things) being too white, too middle class, too.. whatever it is.

As well as all this, it is impressed upon people from the start of most consensus-based meetings that blocking an idea or disagreeing with something is considered incredibly rude. This in itself surely seeks to prevent disagreement with the prevalent ideas and dominant views of those in the meeting who would like to direct it – revealing once more the subsurface power dynamics. If we are not allowed to disagree with what the people who feel comfortable enough to speak say, then what is it that we are discussing? Is there any point at all in being at such a meeting?

The same questions and themes are apparent in public consultations about sustainability issues. I watched a video recently of a veteran sustainability planner in Canada having a somewhat hilarious rant about the failings of public consultations.. The crux of what she was saying is that in most cases, the overall ideas are set in stone (e.g. Southend airport – more on that later) but the nitty gritty minutae are up for discussion. This creates the illusion that the public participants have some control and voice in the matters they are discussing without actually impeding the developers’ plans. It is a task designed to foster compliance. It makes people more willing to accept their fate if they think they have played a part in changing or developing it. In the case of Southend or example, the developers (Easyjet and Stobart) had laid the foundations for a new runway before the planning permission had even been approved – before it had even gone to court. That’s how confident they were that they were going to obtain permission. It just goes to show how in the pockets of the corporations the local councils are – and that’s replicated everywhere, on every scale, every level of government.

Power.

It’s always going to be hard to address these issues. It’s not as if you can change things over night, nor change hard-wired human attitudes and habits. However, it is important that it is something that is recognised in the decision making process. Unfortunately another thing to add to a long list..

“Many radical political organizations founder on the desire for community. Too often people in groups working for social change take mutual friendship to be the goal of the group, and thus judge themselves wanting as a group when they do not achieve such commonality. Such a desire for community often channels energy away from the political goals of the group, and produces a clique atmosphere which keeps groups small and turns away potential members.”

~ Iris Marion Young
from “Justice and the Politics of Difference 1990

(a longer interview appears on manchesterclimatemonthly.net. This is just the “art and activism” question

I am personally very shy of titles, but do do you consider yourself an activist?
I’m also wary of labels, and I find the ‘activist’ moniker a particulary thorny one to lay claim to. I have been on actions and demos in the past but I haven’t been very active recently. I’ve personally become disenchanted with large scale ‘anti’ demos and direct actions (though I have great respect for people who do them) and more in favour of positive, localised, community building work like the Transition Movement. That said, I think that standing up for what we’re against needs to go hand in hand with working towards what we’re for. But paradoxically I’ve found that making artistic work about these issues has meant that often I’ve been too busy writing or rehearsing to take more of an ‘activist’ role. Then there is the question of whether art is a form of activism in itself, a question I’m still debating but haven’t yet found a definitive answer to. I think the problem with labels is that as soon as you apply them to yourself, if you find yourself not doing that particular thing at any time you can become too self-critical and start negating your worth as a person because you have tied your sense of worth to that label. I don’t generally describe myself as an activist, as I feel that there are people out there working far more tirelessly and who are far more committed and self-sacrificing to certain causes than I am. But as I’ve said, those unfavourable comparisons can become damaging, and I’d like to think that a diversity of tactics and approaches should mean that people are free to chart their own course and find their own definitions for what it means to take action.

Everything We Need, runs at the Royal Exchange Theatre 28 – 30 June
Written & Performed by Ben Mellor
Directed by Cheryl Martin
Designed by Sumit Sakar
Lighting Design by Jack Dale
Sound Design & Music by Dan Steele & Leonie Higgins
Tickets
£10 Adults / £7 Concessions
0161 8339833

How:
- Local community (e.g. church, suburb, school, workplace, etc.)
- Public gatherings
- Direct conversations
- Relationships

Who stays involved and why?
- Those who have no choice (e.g. Indigenous struggles), although this is usually when it is supported by a larger local community
- Those who have trouble relinquishing control
- Those who are too stubborn to let failure after failure stop them
- Those who make it their ‘living’ (i.e. professionals working in NGO’s)
- Those who have had positive experiences and actual wins

Why do people stop being involved? Give as many reasons as you like!
- Burn out
- Lack of progression
- Inefficient, boring, pointless and unproductive meetings
- Lack of creativity in tactics
- Relationship break-ups
- Life
- Too much bureaucracy
- Personality clashes
- Failures

If you are no longer involved, what would it take for YOU to get involved again?
I am still involved

What are the barriers to becoming involved (or re-involved)?
- Hard to break into pre-existing social circles
- Not fitting the stereotype (true or otherwise)
- Life
- Different abilities
- Seeing the same mistakes being made over and over again
- Perceived lack of understanding (more precisely, an overtly large amount of ego-foddering by some of those involved)

Hands up if you have;

Been to climate camp
Done a fluffy FOE style action
Written to an MP or newspaper
Got a University degree
Live in fuel poverty
Taken a flight in the last year

Questions other people asked
Grew up in Manchester
Parents born in the UK
Organised a campaign

I felt that discussions and activities were open to everyone and I felt comfortable attending. I learned some new things from the workshops that took place. I was sceptical about some of the anarchist principles behind the organisation of the camp, such as the way meetings were organised. This was supposed to be inclusive and democratic and to allow everyone to express their views, but I don’t feel it achieved this as the more outgoing people obviously took command of discussions and events.

I was disappointed with the lack of cohesive vision or strategy behind the actions that took place as part of the event. Many of them were stunts (such as people gluing themselves naked to buildings) which were designed to attract media attention, and although they did this, the attention was fleeting and the action did not seem to communicate any obvious political message. It seemed to me to reinforce the view that the activists were a load of young people messing about.

I would not attend further climate camps mainly for this reason. A more coherent political vision and organisational structure, with more clearly political actions such as marches, would make me more likely to attend. I would like the political left to organise around a vision that integrates issues such as class, workers rights, identity, and the environment, rather than the fragmented movement that climate camp appeared to be.

One of us is leaving the country soon-ish, and t’other has quite enough on his plate, but is still up for working on this, in collaboration with other people.

There are a series of practical, specific tasks that we would like people to take on.

a) Encouraging people to fill in surveys. These would include

• i)people who are still active or who are no longer active.
  ii) organisations that are still going, and the members (both ‘core’ and ‘peripheral’) of groups that are no longer active.

b) typing up surveys

c) analysing the answers, and creating short briefing papers etc.

d) holding workshops with groups about the project and the results and how the project can be useful

e) encouraging climate groups beyond Manchester to undertake whatever version of reflection (we are under no illusions that there is One True Way to reflect, or that ours is the best from the possible ways for any groups

• i) personal contacts with individuals
• ii) guest-posting on their websites
• iii) articles in relevant magazines and publications (Peace News, Red Pepper, etc etc)

f) encourage groups active on other issues (peace, globalisation, human rights etc) to undertake a similar process (with the same disclaimer

g) keep the website ticking over with new content (different survey questions, observations, summaries of academic articles about these topics

h) conceivably – if there were the appetite for it – hold a similar event late 2012 or early 2013.

i) other stuff that we haven’t written down, or we haven’t thought of!!

If you have any comment on the above, or any availability, we’d love to hear from you.  If you have ideas about groups or individuals we should approach, please get in touch.  endingactivism@gmail.com

Why do people get involved in (climate) activism? And how?
-because they are truly concerned about climate change and want to make a change.

or

-because they like the image of being an activist and get involved in any campaign going

Who stays involved and why?
People who enjoy the lifestyle, fit in socially.

People who are passionate about the cause and think they will make a difference.

Why do people stop being involved? Give as many reasons as  you like!

Because they become apathetic or give up hope.
Because they are frustrated at how things are run.
Because their ideas are not as radical as those around them
Because they have other commitments
Because they find the activism stressful

What are the barriers to becoming involved (or re-involved)?

I don’t believe direct action is the best solution, I would need activism to be less framed around this.

I would find it easier if there were not so many different organisations and they all worked together.

I don’t fit in with the ‘image’ of an activist I am much more quiet and thoughtful than most of the ones I have met, I would like to be able to make my contributions without having to change my personality.

Better thought out campaigns with hard evidence behind them, such as peer-reviewed literature on climate change and its impacts and ways to reduce these and mitigation. There is a lot of peer-reviewed literature around on this such as from the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research.

A lot of the leaflets seem like propaganda in the way they are written, I would feel more comfortable getting involved if they were written in a more factual, less emotive manner