Originally posted at GIFT Exchange. This month I am writing about what cori parrish at North Star Fund calls “the human side of donor programming.” Here I focus on progressive major donor programming, such as donor workshops and conferences. This is something I have experience with, having attended and helped to design programs and retreats at Resource…
After spending some time at the CCTFP conference, I was blown away by the young people I met. I got to know many participants and RG staff and was so impressed by their energy and commitment to social justice. I thought to myself: this is a serious group with a real commitment to gaining skills and getting involved in…
When I started working on building a partnership between Social Justice Fund and the Seattle chapter of Resource Generation, I had no idea that we would end up raising $135,000 and transforming the way SJF makes grants. We moved forward with this partnership, called the Next Generation Giving Project, without knowing exactly how it would…
Reposted from the Social Justice Fund Northwest’s justice journal. In the few weeks leading up to the first meeting of this year’s Next Generation Giving Project, it became clear to me that I have felt something missing since last year’s project ended. I realized I have no space in my life quite like a giving…
Update: On April 1 DC Mayor Vince Gray proposed a new tax bracket of 8.9% for household income over $200,000 a year, a modest increase and a small victory for Save Our Safety Net and coalition partners who have pushed for progressive taxes to fund safety net programs. However, the Mayor also proposed dramatic cuts…
Dear friends, RGers, and MMMCers, It’s been quite a month of organizing and discussion! The core Arizona funding group that grew out of Puente’s presentation at MMMC is working on a number of interesting projects, the highlights of which I am so very excited to share with you. Firstly, we have decided to travel to…
Last summer I sat with Mike G eating burgers and talking about RG while watching the World Cup. It was hot, we were in Detroit, and folks on the streets were in full effect. I left the conversation with the idea that all we needed was to organize the wealth of RG members into the…
From the moment I read Pam Pompey’s blog post about an experience with her organization The Ujamaa Institute on the Grassroots Institute for Fundraising Training’s (GIFT) blog, I could not stop thinking about it. Three months later, it is still my favorite piece of writing on philanthropy. My first thought reading it was, “this should really be on the RG blog,” so it is an honor to present it to you all with some of my thoughts.
We hold the liberation of Black and Indigenous people as central to the liberation of all people. We know that attempted genocide and chattel slavery created the initial foundation for massive wealth disparity in the U.S. and that the continued exploitation and criminalization of those communities upholds the racial wealth divide. We believe that well-resourced Black and Native Left organizing is a critical part of how we all get more free.
We believe social justice movements need to be led by communities most directly impacted by injustice. As young people with access to wealth, we choose to undermine the pattern of funders dictating the work and instead choose to follow the leadership of transformative social justice movements and communities, led by people who are: poor, working-class, Black, Indigenous, of color, women, disabled, queer and trans.
We work towards eradicating classism and towards wholeness. We believe that all classes and communities are interconnected and interdependent and that classism has been used to wedge and divide us. We know that much is lost communally in the name of wealth accumulation and that people with wealth have a lot to gain from returning wealth to the collective and transforming our economy. We know that the current economic system is untenable, and we work to build a solidarity economy.
We believe that people ages 18–35, with wealth and class privilege, are at a pivotal stage in life to make a lifelong commitment to social movements. Youth movements and organizing are, and have been bold and visionary. We are building on the legacy of those who came before us, and we are working for a better world for those who will come after. Young people with access to wealth and class privilege need to be organized as protagonists—actively engaging in and seeking out ways that leverage and redistribute our access to power and resources within our control, and redirect resources and power within the networks and institutions we are connected to. We are committed to resisting ageist norms of people acquiring power and holding on to it and constantly doing leadership development to bring about new leadership.
We believe personal and structural change are deeply connected, and every person has the ability to heal and grow. We are committed to working towards transforming ourselves, our organizations, our communities, and society as a whole through our work. We bring our full selves, our experiences, our stake, and our strategic thinking to build cross-class relationships in working for a just and livable world.
We believe in collective and individual growth, groundedness and interdependence. We know that tensions will arise, and we will approach these with curiosity on behalf of our personal and collective wants. We will work to see tensions as generative rather than destructive and finite. We welcome principled disagreement and will strive to keep conflict generative in service of our broader goals and mission.
We believe in the power of collaboration across class, race, and movements. We know that our vision depends on our relationships with communities, organizations and people across our movement ecosystem, with whom we share similarities and differences. Through our organizing work we also seek ways to invite our families, communities, and other people with access to wealth to this work.
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