Reflections on movement building: Fostering the culture of resistance
and solidarity
17:01, July 27, 2013
Movement building is messy. There are too many factors beyond its
control, too many opportunities for missteps, too many unknowns. There
is no instruction manual. Often, there is barely a clear idea of what
the final outcome should even look like.
For this reason, a movement’s long-term success depends in large part
on its ability at self-reflection or praxis – the merger of theory and
practice. What we are witnessing in Yerevan today is unprecedented.
It’s not perfect but that’s ok. Something worked, and it worked well.
In under a week, the bus fare hike was reversed (at least
temporarily). But, this isn’t the birth of a movement. More important
than a birth, this is the maturing of a movement. This is a movement
that is growing more experienced and more confident with every step it
takes. Behind the backdrop of stopping the 50% bus fare increase, new
forms of organizing and movement building are taking shape – and with
it an emerging new culture of resistance and solidarity, the building
blocks of systemic social change. In light of the recent victory,
self-reflection seems appropriate and prudent.
Today’s movement has unique characteristics. It has no single leader,
and no single organization. While this can be viewed as an asset as
well as a liability, the undeniable truth is that this is serving as
an incredible source of empowerment. Everyone is a leader, everyone is
a follower, and with this comes the responsibilities of both roles.
More importantly, this reinforces the notion that the solutions to
Armenia’s problems don’t lie in waiting for a politician-savior, or in
blind devotion to dogmatic partisanship. The solutions lay in a
collective willingness to take initiative, stand up in the face of
injustice, and try something new. In this sense, the mere
participation in today’s movement is creating and fostering an
empowered citizenry. It’s serving as the training grounds for a new
generation of citizen-activists. For many, this is their first
movement. The taste of victory means many will probably come back for
the next round. They will be more experienced and hopefully more
empowered than when they joined this one.
The movement is structurally innovative, combining techniques borrowed
>From abroad, with genuinely homegrown solutions. It is a loosely
coordinated network of informally organized groups where people are
united around values, ideas, goals, and demands, not organizations. It
is simultaneously online – scattered among various facebook groups and
pages where tactics and strategies are discussed endlessly – and
offline – visible throughout the city in the form of actions and at
the occupy-style general assemblies at Mashtots Park every evening.
Unlike the #Occupy movement however, and much to the credit of our
activists, the movement is not an end in itself. It’s not about
`raising awareness’ or `fighting the good fight’. It’s about winning
very tangible and specific things.Through this structure, the movement
is fostering new values such as horizontalism, equality of voice, and
self-organization. In other words, these are the rules of the game;
there is no other way to play. Anyone attempting to play by different
rules is immediately labeled a provocateur and ostracized. This may
seem heavy handed upon first glance, but in the current Armenian
reality where state and private-interest provocateurs are plenty, it’s
actually been a remarkably effective deterrent against co-optation and
sabotage.
This movement is issue-based, broad-based, and goal-oriented. This
seems obvious on the surface but it’s actually refreshing and
relatively novel for all three factors to be simultaneously present.
The issue itself is almost secondary – surely, there is no shortage of
issues that need addressing in Armenia – but the fact that it is
issue-based is key. In the words of Paulo Freire – `you make the road
by walking’. And you walk by taking one step at a time. Tackling
concrete issues that affect the general population does exactly that.
Unlike other recent attempts at civic mobilization, today’s movement
is not abstract, or rhetorical. It’s focused, and it’s pragmatic. From
the very beginning, it was able to clearly state its goals and
demands, short-term and long-term. There was never any confusion about
what they were after, or why. The ability to do this both protects the
movement from potential co-optation, and guards against confusion
among the public and media. It also builds trust among activists.
Since everyone participates voluntarily, it’s a fairly safe assumption
that everyone you meet in the movement is after the same set of
demands, and is a supporter of the same values.
This movement has introduced a diversity of new and innovative
tactics. Conspicuously absent are the tired and ineffective rallies in
Freedom Square. In its place, is MashtotsPark. Instead of being
lectured at from a podium, people are converging to discuss, do
trainings, become inspired, and get real work done. This is creating a
culture of solidarity among disparate groups and unlikely allies.
Here, the process is just as important as the outcome. Through this
process everyone contributes whatever they are best at, in a
complementary and participatory way. In other words, the movement
becomes a collective of people complimenting each other’s best work.
This is strategically beneficial because it gives participants a sense
of ownership in the movement. It is here, where the shift from cynical
spectator to activist begins, because feeling a sense of ownership
means developing a vested interest in the outcome.
This diversity of tactics is actually the fuel for the movement. They
provide multiple levels of engagement, multiple points of entry into
the movement for different groups of people. If you have the time and
interest, you show up to the general assemblies, where you can join
with others from your neighborhood to organize local actions. If you
have a car, you participate in the free carshare initiative, giving
strangers-turned-allies a ride home. If you’re a passenger late for
work, you refused to pay the new fare. At every level, there are ways
to demonstrate your own form of resistance. It’s simple really – the
more ways there are for people to participate, the more people will
participate.
This movement isn’t asking people to place blind faith in empty
promises. Instead, it organized citizen participation to directly
oppose the fare increase by paying the old fare. This is an accessible
and effective `ask’ that directly involved all those affected. In the
mere act of refusing to pay the fare hike, the average, overwhelmed,
and largely disempowered citizen joined the movement, and immediately
reaped its benefits. As the old saying goes, `Direct action gets the
goods’. Indeed, the effective use of direct action is perhaps the
movement’s greatest strength. When the person sitting next to them on
the bus also refused to pay, it built bonds of solidarity. It also
lowered their costs of resisting because the risk of doing so was
dispersed between them. Eventually, when the entire bus refused to
pay, the individual’s risk to resistance became negligible. It is here
that the culture of resistance begins to take root. This has already
happened on thousands of buses, where many average citizens have
experienced this momentary glimpse of shared resistance. What can be
done in the next round of struggle to continue fostering this shared
sense of resistance?
As mentioned earlier, this isn’t the birth of a movement, but rather
its maturing. The birth was last year, when Mashtots Park was saved
>From being turned into a retail shopping area. Yes, there have been
many movements that preceded Mashtots Park, however, the victory at
Mashtots Park is distinct. Last year, saving this green space was an
end in itself. Today, this green space is the means for a new end.
The victory of Mashtots Park has become a multi-pronged victory, and
it is here, where its strategic importance lies. Last year’s victory
has provided a liberated space for further movement building on issues
unrelated to Mashtots Park. Knowingly or not, the activists that saved
the park last year laid down the foundations of today’s movement by
adding to its toolbox.
Today’s movement is taking initial steps on establishing an
independent bus drivers union, a perfect example of another
multi-pronged goal: Not only will an independent bus drivers union
make the daily lives of bus and marshrutka drivers tangibly better,
but it will also invite their greater participation in the movement,
especially when their rights are being protected. Most importantly
however, an organized transit labor force will provide unprecedented
leverage for future civic mobilizations. The more multi-pronged goals
today’s movement is able to reach, the more tools and assets it can
add to its toolbox for the next round of struggle, whatever it may be.
Not everything works of course. But, that’s ok. Demanding the removals
of HenrikNavasardyan and MisakHambartsoumyan, is a strategically sound
decision. Forcing public officials to take responsibility for their
actions means that next time around, they will think twice before
trying to push through socially unpopular and economically
short-sighted policies. The tactic used here however, that of the
indefinite sit-in outside City Hall, has yet to move the movement
closer to this goal, and understandably. First, a sit-in only provides
one level of engagement for the goal. The fewer levels of engagement,
the fewer people can engage. Second, the dismissal of individuals
isn’t issue-based, or broad-based. This doesn’t diminish its strategic
importance, but it does mean the movement is faced with educating the
public on why and how, before any effective tactic can take place.
Without an effective tactic, its strategic importance doesn’t matter
because reaching the goal becomes improbable. And in movement
building, the failure to reach goals doesn’t necessarily mean the
retention of the status quo; it may mean steps backwards, resources
wasted, spirits broken. Here, the structure and values of today’s
movement can help mitigate by inviting new and innovative ideas
through self-organization. Some may work, others will not, but through
this process the movement becomes smarter and more effective over
time.
Movements are messy. But they’re also special. Countless new activists
have been trained with real-world experience. They have seen what
victory looks like. For many, the past week has indeed been a
life-altering experience. Along the way, new friendships have been
made and old stereotypes broken. Movement building in Armenia has
entered a new stage, and there is no going back. A new culture of
solidarity and resistance has taken root among the residents of
Yerevan. The more self-reflective and intentional the movement can
become in its thinking and action, the more effective it can be in
nurturing this new culture and moving forward to systemic social
change.
Babken Der-Grigorian is a member of the initiative `We’re paying 100
drams’. He lives in Yerevan.
http://hetq.am/eng/opinion/28405/reflections-on-movement-building-fostering-the-culture-of-resistance-and-solidarity.html