By Sara Veltkamp—
Another January has arrived, and it’s a special one. The consensus seems to be that putting the dumpster fire of 2020 behind us is a wonderful thing, though the jarring riots and takeover of the Capitol building last week suggests that we can’t expect turning a page on the calendar will solve our problems. The shapeless, melted mass filled with smoldering trash has a lot to teach us.
For example, 2020 has taught me that to create change and build better systems, we need to focus on our process for doing this work as much as the change we’re hoping to bring about—perhaps even more. The Capitol takeover keenly demonstrates that if the goal is to hold power with no consideration as to how that power is maintained, the consequences—in this case an angry mob of people whose fears have been fostered and angst has been amplified—are dire and do not lead to an advantageous end for anyone.
The world is shifting quickly, rendering meaningful goal setting difficult. We can only guess what the world will look like by the end of 2021, and what we’ll need or want. We’re all experiencing big shifts in the way we think about our role, how we work, and what we feel is important. It’s likely that our answers to these questions will continue to evolve rapidly this year.
Meanwhile, on a societal level, people are fraying the edges of interconnected systems of oppression—white supremacy, patriarchy, unfettered capitalism—that form the worlds in which we operate. Structural change takes time, but it’s clear that “the ways things are” will not always be the way they are. When the world is uncertain, we can lament uncertainty or learn to work with it. These are the only choices we have.
For those of us who want to create structures that work for the majority instead of the minority, we must start with examining this process. Elite business, political, or philanthropic circles coming together behind closed doors to create a plan for how to redistribute wealth, share ownership, build equity, or reshape public life will only ensure we replace existing systems with others that are just as oppressive, no matter the good intentions of the people in those rooms. To create systems that are truly liberating, we must allow them to emerge from decentralized, collective movements.
This is messy. We have to let go of the need for certainty and allow ourselves to be surprised by what emerges. This doesn’t mean, however, that we can just sit back and watch what happens. Developing the processes for collective action is hard work. This work is about building strong relationships—with those you agree with and those you don’t—for the sake of building relationships rather than as a means to an end. For those who are used to leading, the work might be suspending certainty of your “rightness” and letting others with different perspectives take the reins. For those who have been repeatedly told explicitly or implicitly that their voices don’t matter, the work is to join with others who’ve been told the same and continue fighting to be heard. It’s not going to be easy and it will be slower than we want, but we are more likely to succeed and sustain these changes in the long run.
We need more movements like Community–Centric Fundraising that are trying new methods to change underlying power structures, in this case for philanthropy. Whether or not these efforts “work” to generate a specified end, they will contribute to learning around our processes. We need more efforts like this that prioritize the most vulnerable, distribute leadership, adapt and are flexible, make space for everyone to meaningfully contribute, and share lessons from failures.
Another example of upending traditional processes is the efforts of our clients at FORESIGHT. Through support from the Rippel Foundation, they are running an initiative to reinvent health and wellbeing in the U.S. FORESIGHT recognizes that our current healthcare decisions are top-down, and our healthcare system is built to serve those with power and privilege, not those most impacted by health challenges. FORESIGHT’s process reaches deep into communities to hear from the people who the healthcare system is failing. Through in-person and online workshops, they connect with people and ask what being healthy means to them and how the system could better support their wellbeing to inform a new vision of healthcare in our country.
This year, we must celebrate and replicate these efforts, recognizing that the way we make an impact on the world is as important as the impact itself. Let’s set goals that focus on the process and help us navigate our current world, all with an eye to building something better.
