Fighting for Hope
Organizing to Realize Our Dreams

Publisher:  Black Rose Books, Montreal, Canada
Year Published:  1990
Pages:  209pp   Price:  $16.95   ISBN:  0-921689-86-1
Library of Congress Number:  HN49.C6K99 1990   Dewey:  361.8'0971
Resource Type:  Book
Cx Number:  CX4556

Detailed information and advice on how to organize a group for social change.

Abstract: 
Joan Newman Kuyek provides detailed information and advice on how to organize a group for social change from a Canadian perspective. She provides relevant anecdotes, exercises and examples to enhance the understanding of how to build and structure groups, do successful fundraising, research all the possibilities and the keys behind effective leadership. Kuyek explains how to create a culture of hope by reviving community spirit through activities like community newspapers, radio, theatre and education. She details different ways to reclaim the economy with such acts as co-operative living and alternative investment funds. Fighting For Hope shows how to repossess political power either through direct actions like strikes and boycotts, to running for municipal government to try to instil change from the inside.

The book is comprised of four parts. The first part deals with the structures that "keep us in our place" and how they do so, ranging from violence and fear to religion and culture to the media and its messages to dealing with government administration. The second part gives examples and exercises on how we can work together to create a better world through raising community awareness and taking action. The third part is a series of examples and exercises for doing analysis for social change, challenging the reader to look at a situation from all possible angles. The fourth part is the conclusion and provides a variety of examples from organizations across Canada and what they have accomplished through building organized groups.

This is a comprehensive book for those who would like to organize a group for social change with a detailed list of sources for further research.

[abstract by Adrianne Faris]



Table of Contents:

Preface

Part I: The Bars of the Prison
The Bogey-man
Destruction of Community in Canada
Violence and Fear
Management of Information and Communication
Packaging Dissent
The Workplace
Religion and Culture

Part II: Fighting For Hope
Creating a Culture of Hope
Working Together
Reclaiming Economics
Repossessing Political Power

Part III: Doing Analysis: Thinking Like an Organizer
The Exercises

Part IV: Conclusion
Get Real or Get Lost

Subject Headings

• Activism/Radicalism
• Communities
• Community
• Community Economic Development
• Corporate Agenda
• Economic Alternatives
• Hope
• Manuals & Handbooks for Activists & Organizers
• Organizing
• Political Action
• Public Interest Advocacy
• Public Interest Groups
• Public Involvement
• Social Alternatives
• Social Cohesion
• Social Justice Issues
• Strategies for Social Change
• Violence
• Workplace Issues