These power lines are reproductions of the original (very large) power lines created by participants in a strategy workshop I helped design and facilitate for members of the opposition New Directions caucus in Transport Workers Local 100 in New York City, in 1999. (Click on the images for larger pop-up versions.)
By Matt Noyes (in collaboration with David Levin, David Pratt, and Steve Downs)
Okay, you have organized a rank-and-file reform group in your union. You are active and presenting a real challenge to the existing union administration. But how strong are you? How strong is the administration that you are challenging? How has your strength (and theirs) been changing? What are your weaknesses? What are theirs? Does everyone in your group share the same assessment? What are the implications for your strategy?
This is where the spiral of popular education takes shape. You did the preparation work, shared information and built trust, analyzed problems, got and shared new information, planned strategy and people took action. Now what?
Well, assuming you have a group that continues working together, you start all over again: getting people together, sharing information, building trust. But you start in a different place. Now you have a group that has been through a learning process together and taken action to solve problems.
