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Community and Environmental Sociology 573
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The web address for this syllabus is :
http://comm-org.wisc.edu/syllabi/cosyllabus10.htm

WELCOME...

...to Community Organization and Change.  This course will focus on the rich history and contemporary practices of the craft called community organizing.  This is the work of the famous Saul Alinsky, the 1950s and 1960s Civil Rights Movement, and more recently people such as Barack Obama.  It is, fundamentally, about oppression and inequality and the struggles for social change that come from them. 

The Syllabus Process

Because this is a course in community organizing, much of the course will be experiential.  That includes the construction of the course itself.  During the first course meeting we will have our own "community" meeting where we will develop learning goals and strategies.  We will focus on three topics:

1. what everyone wants from the course:  our learning goals will come from this
2. what each person can bring to the course:  our learning strategies will come partly from this
3. what principles and ethics will govern our interactions as a group:  our learning strategies will come partly from this

We will then together produce a full written syllabus. Please note that this will not be a free for all.  The focus of the course will be strictly community organizing, which focuses on how people who are historically excluded from power by discriminatory economic, political, social, and cultural systems can develop their collective abilities to get power.   I will also demand significant reading and writing (typically 60-100 pages a week of reading and 30-50 pages of writing).  So you need to come prepared to engage in a process that involves real work.

Resources for Constructing the Course

Besides my own past syllabi, which you already have access to, there are a variety of syllabi at http://comm-org.wisc.edu/node/23

COURSE REQUIREMENTS

1.  Introductory essay (see week 1 in course calendar for details) -- 10 points

2.  Design and help facilitate one class session -- 10 points

Credit will be given based on timely completion of tasks.  Except for the first five weeks of class, readings should be chosen by two weeks before the class and a draft outline should be available by Sunday evening before the class.  1 point deduction for each day late for each part of the process.

3.  Readings questions/comments -- 2 points x 14 weeks = 28 points

Cite three specific passages in readings (please provide author and page numbers) and offer comments or questions. Total length will probably be half a page to a page. Clear writing and accurate interpretation of the readings will be grading criteria.  Post comments/questions to appropriate section of Learn@UW forum. Due before class.  50% reduction in points for each day late.

4.  Class learnings comments -- 2 points x 14 weeks = 28 points

Cite three specific parts of each class session and briefly discussed what you learned from those portions of class. Total length will probably be half a page to a page.  Clear writing and accurate interpretation of in-class source material will be grading criteria. Post learnings to appropriate section of Learn@UW forum. Due before next class. 50% reduction in points for each day late.  If you miss a class you will not be able to complete this assignment, but that will only harm your grade if you do poorly on other requirements or miss multiple classes.

5.  Final Project -- 25 points (5 points for proposal, 5 points for draft/progress report, 15 points for final draft)

Final projects will be proposed by the student.  The main criteria for an accepted proposal will be that the project focuses on community organizing, involves approximately 20 hours of work, and promotes student skill/knowledge development. Possible projects can range from traditional papers (about 15 pages with 15 references for undergrads and 25 pages with 25 references for grads) to multimedia projects to hands-on learning with groups that you already have a relationship with (it is too late to start cold with a group).  Proposals are due October 5 and should be one-half to one page long, stating what you will do, why it is relevant to community organizing, and a brief outline or workplan. Drafts or progress reports are due Nov. 30 and should provide, for papers, a full rough draft.  For other projects, you should provide a report showing you have stuck to the agreed upon work plan.  Final products are due during the regularly scheduled final exam time.  Submit all materials that have a digital form via the Learn@UW dropbox. 50% reduction in points for each day late for each stage of the process.

Grading scale

A = 94-101
AB = 89-93
B = 82-88
BC = 77-81
C = 70-76
D = 63-69
F = 0-62

COURSE CALENDAR

Sept. 7:  Introduction and Course Design

In order to have a productive discussion there will be both a reading assignment and a writing assignment due at the beginning of the first class meeting on September 7.  When you do the reading, bring questions, objections, critiques, and reactions to talk about in class.  When you do the writing, do it to contribute to our planning the rest of the course.

Reading Assignment:

Chris Valley.  2008.  Alinsky at 100.  Journal of Community Practice vol:16 iss:4 pg:527 -532.  http://www.informaworld.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/smpp/content~content=a906666675~db=all

Mike Miller.  2010.  Alinsky for the Left:  The Politics of Community Organizing.  Dissent
http://ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=hlh&AN=47660309&site=ehost-live

Ellen Ryan.  2010.  Whatever Happened to Community Organizing?  COMM-ORG Papers.  http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2010/ryan.htm

Gary Delgado.  2009.  Reflections on Movement Building and Community Organizing.  Social Policy Summer2009, Vol. 39 Issue 2, p6-14. http://ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=sih&AN=44680031&site=ehost-live

Randy Stoecker.  2010.  Has the Fight Gone out of Organizing?  Shelterforce, in press.  http://comm-org.wisc.edu/drafts/shelterforce.doc .

Writing Assignment:

Due no later than the beginning of class on September 7, is a minimum 500 word essay on what you want from the course and what you are able and willing to bring to the course.  You are welcomed to e-mail the assignment at any time up to the deadline or bring it with you to class.  The purpose of this assignment is for you to do careful reflection on your interests and your own resources and skills.  It will be worth ten percent of your final grade and will be graded as a serious writing assignment.  So put your best thinking and your best writing into it.  I will expect thoughtfulness and detail.  And it needs to be about community organizing.  You may not have had community organizing experiences, but you have other skills and knowledge you can bring.  And if you don't want to learn anything about community organizing, then this isn't the right course for you.  You can see my assignment below.

Note:

Please also get Saul Alinsky's book, Rules for Radicals.  It is the closest thing to a core text in the field.  We will read and discuss that the second week, which will buy us time to get the other readings in order after our first class planning session.  I have ordered the book to be available at Rainbow Bookstore Co-op, 426 West Gilman Street (just off of State St.).  If you want it sooner, you can also order it directly from them.

Example Assignment

What I Want and What I Bring

Randy Stoecker

I don't exactly know how it is that I became interested in how oppressed peoples organize to build their own power. But from a teenager on that has been my focus. I have always wanted to find out how people without power can get more control over their own circumstances. As a sociologist, I spent a lot of time studying how bad things are. So I am quite convinced that things are very bad. The social structures of race, class, sex, ability, age, and others produce frightening and unjustifiable inequalities. But I got bored with learning how bad things are, and I don't need any more convincing. What I need is to learn how people successfully fight back against those oppressions and inequalities.

It's actually a lot more exciting for me to study how people fight back. First, even when they don't win, it is a lot more inspiring than just studying how people get oppressed. And when they do win it's really inspiring. Thankfully, I had the good luck in graduate school to live smack dab in the middle of a neighborhood that fought back against a government-capitalist developer coalition that tried to literally bulldoze them off the map. Not only did they win, but they got to then redevelop their own neighborhood. the folks of the West Bank neighborhood in Minneapolis taught me how to be inspired.

But there are still far too few examples like that neighborhood. So one thing I want is to learn more about more examples, which I know are out there. So I am trying to collect as many examples--both successes and failures, as I can. There are a bunch of new books I want to read: Contesting Community, Tools for Radical Democracy, Creative Community Organizing, Progressive Community Organizing, Seeds of Change: The Story of ACORN, Organizing Urban America, The Revolution Will not be Funded, Streetwise for Book Smarts: Grassroots Organizing and Education Reform in the Bronx, and others.

I can bring a fairly long history of experience with such groups. I started learning about community organizing first-hand in that Minneapolis neighborhood in 1983, and formally started doing research with them in 1985. I’ve been working with them from time to time ever since.

I can’t say that I’m an actual community organizer, though I’ve got a couple of successes under my belt (the most fun was organizing against my previous university when they wanted to replace a park with a parking lot in my neighborhood). But I also haven’t just read about and studied what people have done. Instead, I have been involved in supporting community groups’ organizing work. So I’ve mostly provided research support for community organizing groups to help them do their work better, using a method called participatory action research. I’ve worked with ACORN most closely, but also with a number of unaffiliated neighborhood organizing groups. I have helped such groups also by facilitating strategic planning and strategy development.

Perhaps most importantly for this course, I have learned a lot about teaching by hanging out with community organizers. I’ve seen community organizers teach people lots of stuff, and I’ve never once seen them give a lecture. So I’ve also learned to teach by facilitating, mostly by paying close attention to the work of two people—Myles Horton and Paulo Friere—both of whom developed models of community organizing that integrated community education and community organizing.

Week 2, Sept. 14—History:  Saul Alinsky

Facilitators:  Amanda Hane, Brian Hedberg, Make MacCrimmon, Rebecca Paradiso

Reading Assignment:

Saul Alinsky, Rules for Radicals (read entire book)

OR about 100 pages from the following articles:

Saul Alinsky. 1965.  "The War on Poverty-Political Pornography"
http://ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=sih&AN=16468389&site=ehost-live

Robert Fisher, "Neighborhood Organizing: The Importance of Historical Contba"
http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers96/fishercon.htm

Three Alinskys? by Peter Szynka, 2002,
http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2002/szynkaa.htm

Donald Rietzes and Dietrich Rietzes.  1982.  Saul D. Alinsky:  A Neglected Source but Promising Resource.
http://ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=sih&AN=4943466&site=ehost-live

Wendy Plotkin. 1996. "Alinsky and Back of the Yards Neighborhood Council."
http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers96/alinsky/bync.html

Wendy Plotkin. 1996 "Alinsky's involvement in Woodlawn in Chicago/The Woodlawn Organization."
http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers96/alinsky/woodlawn.html

Understanding Alinsky Conservative Wine in Radical Bottles; CHARLES F LEVINE. The American Behavioral Scientist (pre-1986). Nov/Dec 1973. Vol. 17, Iss. 2; p. 279 (6 pages)
http://proquest.umi.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/pqdweb?index=0&did=725027541&SrchMode=1&sid=4&Fmt=6&VInst=PROD&VType=PQD&RQT=309&VName=PQD&TS=1284123350&clientId=3751

SAUL D. ALINSKY: A NEGLECTED SOURCE BUT PROMISING RESOURCE. By: Reitzes, Donald C.; Reitzes, Dietrich C.. American Sociologist, Feb82, Vol. 17 Issue 1, p47-56
http://web.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/ehost/viewarticle?data=dGJyMPPp44rp2%2fdV0%2bnjisfk5Ie46%2fWF39qshd%2ff7Ebj3u2L8ra3R6%2bmrUqup644trCzSrintji%2fw6SM8Nfsi9%2fZ8oHt5Od8u6O1TrGutEyvp7U%2b6tfsf7vb7D7i2LuL596kjN%2fdu1nMnN%2bGu6q3TLGqtE6k3O2K69fyVe7a5F7z4ups4%2b7y&hid=11

The influence of Saul Alinsky on the campaign for human development.Full Tba Available  By: ENGEL, LAWRENCE J.. Theological Studies, Dec98, Vol. 59 Issue 4, p636
http://web.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/ehost/viewarticle?data=dGJyMPPp44rp2%2fdV0%2bnjisfk5Ie46%2fWF39qshd%2ff7Ebj3u2L8ra3R6%2bmrUqup644t7CuT7irszi%2fw6SM8Nfsi9%2fZ8oHt5Od8u6e2UbWstk21rbY%2b6tfsf7vb7D7i2Lt57t6kjN%2fdu1nMnN%2bGu6eySbGos0qk3O2K69fyVe7a5F7z4ups4%2b7y&hid=11

Hillary Clinton's thesis on Saul ALinsky 1969
http://www.gopublius.com/?page_id=199

Interview with Saul ALinsky 1972 (originally in Playboy but now provided on an independent site)
http://www.progress.org/2003/alinsky2.htm

Writing Assignment:

This assignment will be graded pass/no credit and worth 2% of your grade:

Bring three comments or questions on the readings to class.  Questions/comments might be to clarify something that wasn't understood, address connections or tensions between the readings, explore ways to use Alinsky's ideas in our own work, address any other implications of his ideas, or connect the readings to previous experiences (academic, professional or personal).

Week 3, Sept. 21—History of Community Organizing

Facilitators:  Benjamin Blohoweak, Ali Loker, Nicole Peterson

Reading Assignment:

An Internet Guide to Community Organizing by Shayna Strom. Poverty and Race Research Action Council. http://www.prrac.org/full_text.php?text_id=964&item_id=8814&newsletter_id=0&header=Community+Organizing

A Way of Thinking About the History of Community Organizing, by Stephen Valocchi. http://www.trincoll.edu/depts/tcn/valocchi.htm

Neighborhood Organizing: The Importance of Historical Context, by Robert Fisher.http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers96/fishercon.htm

The Fight in the Fields: Cesar Chavez and the Farmworkers' Strugglehttp://www.pbs.org/itvs/fightfields/timeline.html

Community Organizing: Addams and Alinsky. by Maurice Hamingtonhttp://www.philosophy.uncc.edu/mleldrid/SAAP/MSU/P04R.html

Neither Bedecked Nor Bebosomed": Lucy Mason, Ella Baker and Women's Leadership and Organizing Strategies in the Struggle for Freedom. by Susan Glisson, http://www.livedtheology.org/pdfs/s_glisson.pdf

Looking to the Light of Freedom: Lessons from the Civil Rights Movement and Thoughts on Anarchist Organizing. by Chris Crasshttp://www.infoshop.org/rants/crass_light.html

Ella Baker: Free Agent in the Civil Rights Movement. by Aprele Elliott. Journal of Black Studies, 1996. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/stable/pdfplus/2784885.pdf

Writing Assignment:

Readings questions/comments due before class and class learnings comments due before next class.

Week 4, Sept. 28—Organizing compared to other models (service delivery, activism, advocacy, development, pseudo participation)

Facilitators:  Sean Becker, Leah Edgar,  Katie Grimm, Justine Marcus

Report to the West Bank CDC: Primer on Community Organizing Randy Stoecker,  http://comm-org.wisc.edu/drafts/crreporta.htm

Community Organizing, Building and Developing: Their Relationship to Comprehensive Community Initiatives by Douglas R. Hess,  http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers99/hesscontents.htm

Rowing the Boat with Two Oars April, 1999 By Steve Callahan, Neil Mayer, Kris Palmer, and Larry Ferlazzo.  http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers99/callahan.htm

Randy Stoecker & Susan Stall, "Community Organizing or Organizing Community?: Gender and the Crafts of Empowerment".  http://www.jstor.org/pss/190515 or http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers96/gender2.html

Doing Green Jobs Right, Amy B. Dean, http://www.thenation.com/article/154165/doing-green-jobs-right

and one of the following

Writing Assignment:

Readings questions/comments due before class and class learnings comments due before next class.

Week 5, Oct. 5— Definitions of power and ideology in organizing

Facilitators:  Jennifer Bloesch, Teresa Kazmerzak, Katie Obradovich

Reading Assignment:

Alinsky, Rules for Radicals, "Of Means and Ends" and "A Word about Words"

PLEASE be sure to read the last article (the one that Randy is a co-author of. This will be important for part of class discussion)

CORE CONCEPT: POWER http://proquest.umi.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/pqdweb?vinst=PROD&fmt=6&startpage=-1&clientid=3751&vname=PQD&RQT=309&did=9345915&scaling=FULL&ts=1285177347&vtype=PQD&rqt=309&TS=1285177355&clientId=3751)http://www.augsburg.edu/cdc/publicachievement/pdf/articles_papers/core_concept_power.pdf  

Community organizing: An ecological route to empowerment and power: http://proquest.umi.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/pqdweb?vinst=PROD&fmt=6&startpage=-1&vname=PQD&RQT=309&did=9345920&scaling=FULL&vtype=PQD&rqt=309&cfc=1&TS=1285176997&clientId=3751)http://proquest.umi.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/pqdweb?vinst=PROD&fmt=6&startpage=-1&clientid=3751&vname=PQD&RQT=309&did=9345915&scaling=FULL&ts=1285177347&vtype=PQD&rqt=309&TS=1285177355&clientId=3751  

Speaking truth to power: Empowerment ideology as social intervention and policy
http://proquest.umi.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/pqdweb?vinst=PROD&fmt=6&startpage=-1&vname=PQD&RQT=309&did=9345920&scaling=FULL&vtype=PQD&rqt=309&cfc=1&TS=1285176997&clientId=3751

Kavitha Mediratta and Clay Smith. 2001. Advancing Community Organizing Practice: Lessons from Grassroots Organizations in India. COMM-ORG, http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2001/mediratta/title.htm 

Fisher, R. & Kling, J.N. (1987). Leading the people: Two approaches to the role of ideology in community organizing. Radical America. 21(l), 31-45.

Rapp, D.W. (1982). Ideology as an aspect of community organization and advocacy. Social Development Issues, 6(1), 53-61.

Robert Kleidman (2004) Community Organizing and Regionalism. City & Community 3 (4), 403–421 (available on UW Library system)

Cheryl Honey. 2006. Community Organizing: Past, Present, and Future. COMM-ORG, http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2006/honey.htm

Stall, Susan, and Randy Stoecker. 1998. "Community Organizing or Organizing Community? Gender and the Crafts of Empowerment." http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers96/gender2.html 

Writing Assignment:

Readings questions/comments due before class and class learnings comments due before next class.

Final project proposal

Week 6, Oct. 12— how-to:  outsider-insider

Facilitators:  Hannah Birkholz, Danielle Dovnik

Reading Assignment:

All read:

Two chapters from the books (suggested: Sen, Stir it Up, "Leading the Way"; Kahn, Creative Community Organizing, ""Unite the Divided, Divide the United"

Insider/Outsider Upsides and Downsides, by Lee H. Staples. http://www.informaworld.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/smpp/ftinterface~content=a904539922~fulltext=713240930~frm=content

Choose:

Alinsky, Rules for Radicals, "The Education of an Organizer"

Fenway's Formidable Force By Charles Duke, III http://www.nhi.org/online/issues/116/Fenway.html

Confronting the insider-outsider polemic in conducting research with diasporic communities: towards a community-based approach. by Bruce Collett, http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Confronting+the+insider-outsider+polemic+in+conducting+research+with...-a0180553146

Responding to Intervention: Gender, Knowledge and Authority 10. Insider/Outsider Politics: Implementing Gendered Participation in Water Resource Management, by Kathleen O'Reilly http://www.idrc.ca/en/ev-126373-201-1-DO_TOPIC.html

Writing Assignment:

Readings questions/comments due before class and class learnings comments due before next class.

Week 7 Oct. 19— how-to:  relational processes

Facilitators:  Patricia Lewis, Dena Ohlinger

Guest:  Brian Christens

Reading Assignment:

All read:

Public relationship building in grassroots community organizing: relational intervention for individual and systems change, by Brian Christens.  http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/doi/10.1002/jcop.20403/full

Two chapters from the books (recommended: Creative Community Organizing by Si Kahn "Lift Every Voice"; Tools for Radical Democracy by J. Minieri and P. Getsos "Involving Members in Building Their Own Organization").

Choose:

Saul Alinsky's Chapter "Communication"

Trust Building Among Strangers by Teck-Hua Ho and Keith Weigelt, http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/stable/pdfplus/20110350.pdf

When one plus one equals three: The role of relationships and context in community research by Ann Brodsky et al., http://www.springerlink.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/content/u8613w044h50g716/fulltext.pdf

Citizen Participation in Neighborhood Organizations and Its Relationship to Volunteers' Self- and Collective Efficacy and Sense of Community by Ohmer, Mary L. http://ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=sih&AN=25849550&site=ehost-live

Writing Assignment:

Readings questions/comments due before class and class learnings comments due before next class.

Week 8, Oct. 26— how-to:  cutting an issue and framing it

Facilitators:  Benjamin Vondra, Rebecca Tucci

Reading Assignment:

All read:

Robert Benford and David Snow.  2000.  Framing Processes and Social Movements.  Annual Review of Sociology.  Vol. 26, pp. 611-39. http://www.annualreviews.org/doi/pdf/10.1146/annurev.soc.26.1.611

Two chapters from the books (recommended: Creative Community Organizing, by Si Kahn, Chapter 7: Strengthen the Story; Progressive Community Organizing by Loretta Pyles, chapter 8: "Language Matters"; and Stir it Up by Rinku Sen, chapter 3: "Picking the Good Fight").

Choose:

Alinsky, Rules for Radicals, "In the Beginning"

Deborah Lynn Marois. Beyond Polarities: Collaboration and Conflict in Community Health Partnerships. Chapter Five: Sources of Conflict in Community Partnerships. Defining and Reframing Conflict. http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2006/marois.htm#ch5

Peter Dreier. ACORN and Progressive Politics in America. Section titled “Since the 1970s: The Rise of the Right - the Left on the Defensive.” http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2005/dreier.htm

Public Narrative: http://comm-org.wisc.edu/syllabi/ganz/WhatisPublicNarrative5.19.08.htm

Power of Story: http://web.uvic.ca/ocbr/assets/pdfs/Power_of_Story.pdf

Writing Assignment:

Readings questions/comments due before class and class learnings comments due before next class.

Week 9, Nov. 2— how-to:  identifying a target and negotiating

Facilitators:  Kevin Gajewski, Drew Newman, Alicia Sklan

Reading Assignment:

All read:

Two chapters from books (suggested: Roots to Power – Lee Staples: Pg, 116-127 – Cutting and Framing the Issue: Action Group, Goals and Objectives, Target System and Handles Pg. 143-161 -  “Moving Into Action:” Making and Carrying Out Action Plans Tools for Radical Democracy – Joan Minieri and Paul Getsos: Chapter 7 – Identifying the Right Issue Creative Community Organizing – Si Kahn Chapter 3 and 4)

Dave Beckwith with Cristina Lopez. Community Organizing: People Power from the Grassroots http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers97/beckwith.htm

Moshe ben Asher. CONFLICT & COOPERATION IN MACRO THEORY & PRACTICE http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2002/benasher/benashertheory.htm

Tactics of Targets  http://comm-org.wisc.edu/resources/tactics.htm

Choose:

How to… Negotiate. http://www.npaction.org/resources/WORC/negot.pdf

Setting the Housing Agenda. http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2002/hertz/housing.htm

Quilen Diedre Blackwell.  Holding Corporate America’s Feet to the Fire: The Industrial Areas Foundation’s Collision Course with Kodak. http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2009/blackwell.htm

Alinsky, Rules for Radicals, "Tactics"

Writing Assignment:

Readings questions/comments due before class and class learnings comments due before next class.

Week 10, Nov. 9— how-to:  managing internal organizational issues

Facilitators:  Emily Heenan, Alexandria Kohorst, Alisa Ahmed

Reading Assignment:

All read:

Two chapters from the books (suggested: Pyles, Progressive Community Organizing, "Toward Empowering Organizations"; Staples, Roots to Power, "Keeping It All Together"; Minieri and Getsos, Tools for Radical Democracy, "Developing Leaders from All Walks of Life")

Overcoming Oligarchy: Culture and Agency in Social Movement Organizations by Paul Osterman http://www.atypon-link.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/JGSCU/doi/abs/10.2189/asqu.51.4.622 

Choose:

Black Southern Student Sit-in Movement: An Analysis of Internal Organization by Aldon Morris http://www.jstor.org/stable/2095077?seq=2 

"Community, Movement, Organization: The Problem of Identity Convergence in Collective Action" Randy Stoecker. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/stable/4121280 

"Organizational Structure, Authority and Protest: The Case of Union Organizing in the United States, 1990-2001" Andrew W. Martin. http://muse.jhu.edu.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/journals/social_forces/v085/85.3martin.html

"Leader-Member Conflict in Protest Organizations: The Case of the Southern Farmers' Alliance" Michael Schwartz; Naomi Rosenthal; Laura Schwartz. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/sici?origin=sfx%3Asfx&sici=0037-7791%281981%2929%3A1%3C22%3ALCIPOT%3E2.0.CO%3B2-3

"Neighborhood Strengthening through Community Building" Suzanne M. Singhhttp://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2003/singh.htm#limits 

"Foundation Funding of Grassroots Organizations" by Robert O. Bothwell. http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2001/bothwell.htm 

"Citizen Action, Knowledge and Global Economic Power: Intersections of Popular Education, Organizing, and Advocacy" Lisa VeneKlasen & Darshana Patel. http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2006/darshana.htm 

Writing Assignment:

Readings questions/comments due before class and class learnings comments due before next class.

Week 11, Nov. 16— how-to:  moving from one level to the next

Facilitators:  Ashley Umberger

Reading Assignment:

All read:

Organizing Nationally to Win Locally: Faith-Based Community Organizing’s New Frontier, by Heidi J. Swarts. http://www.shelterforce.org/article/1868/organizing_nationally_to_win_locally_faith-based_community_organizings_new_/

Two chapters from the books (recommended: "Know When to Raise the Stakes" from Creative Community Organizing by Si Kahn)

Choose:

National Work Among Community Organizing Groups Is Growing, by Peter Dreier. http://www.rooflines.org/1640/national_work_among_community_organizing_groups_is_growing/

From Local To Global: The Anti-Dam Movement In Southern Brazil, 1979-1992” by Franklin Daniel Rothman and Pamela E. Oliver: http://www.ssc.wisc.edu/~oliver/PROTESTS/ArticleCopies/RothmanOliver1999MobyFromLocaltoGlobal.pdf

Living Wage Campaigns From a 'Social Movement' Perspective: The Miami Case” by Bruce Nissen: http://web.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=2&hid=7&sid=1bc68f05-2289-49fc-9bcd-03807a6b42d4%40sessionmgr15

Health Care Reform and Social Movements in the United States” by Beatrix Hoffman: http://ajph.aphapublications.org/cgi/content/full/93/1/75

Lessons from Arizona: Direct Action Organizing from 1999 to Now” by Davey D: http://hiphopandpolitics.wordpress.com/2010/09/24/lessons-from-arizona-direct-action-organizing-from-1999-to-now/

Milwaukee MEChA builds for National Day of Action against SB1070” by Natasha Morgan: http://www.fightbacknews.org/2010/7/27/milwaukee-mecha-builds-national-day-action-against-sb1070

Writing Assignment:

Readings questions/comments due before class and class learnings comments due before next class.

Week 12, Nov. 23— how-to:  using research in organizing

Facilitators:  Randy Stoecker

Reading Assignment:

All read:

CBR and the Two Forms of Social Change, Randy Stoecker. http://comm-org.wisc.edu/drafts/kleinerchapter.docx

Two chapters from the books (Collette, p. 222, in Roots to Power by Lee Staples,  Ch. 6 from Stir it up by Rinku Sen, "Know when to raise the stakes" in Creative Community Organizing by Si Kahn, Chs 5 or 7 in Progressive Community Organizing by Loretta Pyles, Chs 8, 10, or 13 in Tools for Radical Democracy by Minieri and Getsos.)

On Popular Education by John Hurst. http://nlu.nl.edu/academics/cas/ace/resources/johnhurst.cfm

Choose:

Myles Horton and Paulo Freire.  "Editor's Introduction" in We Make the Road by Walking. http://www.temple.edu/tempress/chapters/804_ch1.pdf 

Randy Stoecker. 2005. Research Methods for Community Change. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Chapter 3, http://www.sagepub.com/upm-data/4937_Stoecker__Chapter_3.pdf

Randy Stoecker and Mary Beckman. 2009. Making Higher Education Civic Engagement Matter in the Community. http://www.compact.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/engagementproof-1.pdf

Randy Stoecker (ed). 1996. Sociology and Social Action--two special issues of Sociological Imagination, http://comm-org.wisc.edu/si/sihome.htm

Anne B. Shlay and Gordon Whitman. 2004. Research for Democracy: Linking Community Organizing and Research to Leverage Blight Policy. COMM-ORG, http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2004/shlay/shlay.htm

Lutz Wessels. 2003. Research! Investigating, Organising and Fighting. COMM-ORG, http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2003/wessels.htm 

Writing Assignment:

Readings questions/comments due before class and class learnings comments due before next class.

Week 13, Nov. 30— how-to:  factions and unity

Facilitators:  Jolie Lizotte, Sara Witty, Grace Boblick, Kelsey Van Ert

Reading Assignment:

All Read:

Ain't Gonna Let Segregation Turn Us Around, Amanda Klonsky, an Daraka Laramore-Hall.  The Activist:  Culture Politics and Action, 2000. http://www.cwsworkshop.org/pdfs/SIS/Perspectives/5_Aint_Gonna_let.PDF, or http://www.soaw.orgindex.php/?option=com_content&view=article&id=490

Two chapters from the books:  -"Forging partnerships for power" ch.14 in Minieri & Getsos; "Find the Glue" ch 10 in Si Kahn;  Sections from ch7 "Nuts & Bolts" from Staples on coalition building: "community-labor coalitions", "coalitions & other relations", and "coalitions: essential tools for organizing"

Choose:

Articles from The Revolution will not be Funded on e-reserve: 

Chris Dixon, 'Ten Things to Remember: Anti-Racist Strategies for White Student Radicals', http://www.cwsworkshop.org/pdfs/CARA/AOYP/CGWPB/1_Ten_Things.PDF

Tema Okun, 'White Supremacy Culture', http://www.cwsworkshop.org/pdfs/CARC/Overview/2_Culture_White_Sup.PDF

Jennifer Holladay, 'Roles We Can Play', http://www.cwsworkshop.org/pdfs/CARA/AOYP/CIWPB/4_Roles.PDF

Randy Stoecker. 1993. The Federated Frontstage Structure and Localized Social Movements: A Case Study of the Cedar-Riverside Neighborhood Movement. Social Science Quarterly Vol. 74 Issue 1, p169-184 http://search.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=9303180839&loginpage=Login.asp&site=ehost-live

Complexities of coalition building http://proquest.umi.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/pqdlink?Ver=1&Exp=11-15-2015&FMT=7&DID=68081838&RQT=309&cfc=1

Michelle O'Brien.  Whose Ally?  http://www.docstoc.com/docs/51272186/Thinking-critically-about-anti-oppression-ally-organizing

Writing Assignment:

Readings questions/comments due before class and class learnings comments due before next class.

Final project draft or progress report

Week 14, Dec. 7— how-to:  tech and organizing

Facilitators:  Cassie Von Alst, Molly Christianson

Reading Assignment:

Required:

Two chapters from the books (recommended: Sen, Ch. 8).

Janna Moseley, Online Organizing at ACORN.  2010.  COMM-ORG, http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2010/moseley.htm

Choose:

William K. Carroll and Robert A. Hackett. 2006. Democratic media activism through the lens of social movement theory. Media, Culture & Society 28: 83-104. http://mcs.sagepub.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/cgi/reprint/28/1/83

Randy Stoecker. 2002. "Cyberspace vs. Face to face: Community Organizing in the New Millennium." Perspectives on Global Development and Technology. 1:143-164.http://search.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=8798061&loginpage=Login.asp&site=ehost-live 

Writing Assignment:

Readings questions/comments due before class and class learnings comments due before next class.

Week 15, Dec. 14—Organizing in diverse communities (immigrants, youth, women, global)

 Facilitators:  Megan Parsons, Meghan Heitman, Krostofer Canto

Reading Assignment:

All read:

Two chapters from the books (recommended: Minieri and Getsos, Ch. 5, Developing Leaders from All Walks of Life; Kahn: Chapter 3, Check Your Stereotypes at the Door)

Saul Alinsky. Rules for Radicals: The Way Ahead

Comparison between American and Chinese Community Building http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2004/zhangxi.htm

Community Organizing and the Alinsky Tradition in Germany http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2002/szynkag.htm

Choose:

Forging a Global Movement: New Education Rights Strategies for the US and the World http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2007/reilly.htm

Advancing Community Organizing Practice: Lessons from Grassroots Organizations in India http://comm-org.wisc.edu/papers2001/mediratta/title.htm

The Zapatista Autonomy Movement in Chiapas, Mexico http://lasa.international.pitt.edu/members/congress-papers/lasa2004/files/Stahler-SholkRichard_xCD.pdf

Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle http://www.cloudforestmexico.org/PDF/Sixth%20Declaration%20of%20the%20Lacandon%20Jungle.pdf

The Use of Ecological Science by Rural Producers: A Case Study in Mexico http://www.ciga.unam.mx/investigadores/zacatuche/PDF/611Articulos%20de%20investigacion%20en%20revistas%20arbitradas/6114Revistas%20Internacionales%20(indexadas%20en%20el%20science%20citation%20index)/6114-25.pdf

Marschke, M. and Nong, K. (2003). Adaptive Co-Management: Lessons from Coastal Cambodia. Canadian Journal of Development Studies, 24 (3), 369-383. http://www.cc.umanitoba.ca/institutes/natural_resources/canadaresearchchair/Adaptive%20Co-Management%20-%20Lessons%20from%20Coastal%20Cambodia.pdf

http://www.healafrica.org/ - Just look around this site and look at the programs that they have to empower women in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and change the way they live.

Brian D. Christens and Tom Dolan. 2010.Interweaving Youth Development, Community Development, and Social Change through Youth Organizing. Youth and Society. http://yas.sagepub.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/content/early/2010/10/01/0044118X10383647.full.pdf+html (must be on campus to access)

Daniel Wei Hosang. 2006. Family and Community as the Cornerstone of Civic Engagement: Immigrant and Youth Organizing in the Southwest. National Civic Review 95 no4 58-61 http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/doi/10.1002/ncr.160/pdf

Writing Assignment:

Readings questions/comments due before class and class learnings comments due before 12-21 at 2:25pm.

Finals Week

Writing Assignment:

Final projects final products and final learnings from last class-- December 21, 2:25pm.