Activist Fleadh

by Laurence Cox - Activist Fleadh Fri Jul 23, 2010 22:51

Saturday 14th August

Introduction to work-camps

The work-camps are designed to enable us all - activists and non-activists, radicals of all ages and people in many different communities, movements and struggles - to find spaces to talk to each other about what we have in common:

- What are the big structures of power and inequality that shape our world, and how do we meet them?
- How can we find effective ways of protesting, disrupting, constructing alternatives and taking action?
- How can our local struggles connect to large-scale strategies for change that have a real chance of success?
- What is the "big picture" in terms of global justice and ecological sustainability, and where do we fit in?
- How do personal transformation and the development of leadership come into the struggle for a better world?

9.30 - Arrival and registration

10.00 - Gathering in plenary

10.15 - Opening and welcome:
• Why are we here? Opening Address ; Representatives from Kilbarrack ‘fight the cuts’ group and Representatives from Kilbarrack Youth Group
• Setting the scene for the 'Speak-outs'

11.15 - Thematic facilitated work camps

1) Social Inequality (with a particular focus on class, gender, race)
This work camp will support the articulation of a collective voice on the nature and lived experience of the structural inequalities which are deeply embedded in Irish society and which restrict so many people’s lives ; it will also explore what needs to happen to challenge and help dismantle these structures and how we can all be a part of this

2) Fighting the Cutbacks- Ways of Protesting
This work camp will concentrate on developing creative ways to resist cutbacks and changes in policy, and most especially to identify and challenge what has been happening to leaders (formal and informal) in the community development, equality and disability sectors. We plan to write articles, poems, verse and limericks and anything else that comes up during the workcamps. Creative support and inspiration will be provided (as will computers and powerpoint access).

3) Transformation- Bringing about Change
Most of the time our work has to be in a specific place, around a specific issue - but we are motivated by the thought that our local efforts, together with the struggles of other people in other places around other issues, might add up to a much bigger change.
This work camp will be around "joining the dots" - getting from structures of inequality to a just and sustainable world, bringing together personal change and effective protesting into effective struggles for change that might really make a difference on a large scale.

4) Sustainability and Global Justice
The scale of global inequalities can make action for justice at a global level seem daunting. This workcamp will link some of the causes and impacts of structural inequalities in Ireland with those of people throughout the world. It will further explore if and how we can forge solidarities between ‘local’ struggles for economic, social, political and environmental justice and those being undertaken by people in the Global South.

5) Finding and supporting the Warrior Leader (in ourselves and others)
This work-camp will explore how, our human potential is developed, not only through looking at how we relate to ourselves and those close to us, but also by becoming aware of how we influence society and the world by our thinking and our actions or inactions.
Through different activities, participants will work towards an understanding of how to be more effective as active agents of sustainable change in the wider community, while also respecting and supporting each other in a supportive and holistic process. Possible tools and traditions being drawn on: authentic leadership; yoga; 'mindfulness' meditation; story- telling; deep listening; liberation theology.

6. Young People as Change Makers
Change takes many forms; it doesn’t have to be a global, economic or even community change to be significant. In order to seek change on a larger scale we sometimes need to look within to find the strength and courage to make some changes for and in ourselves. We then may feel ready to move to bigger changes. Continuing a legacy of generations before us is easy as sometimes it is all we know. However change making and pattern breaking are possible and achievable. This work camp will support participants to identify changes they can make.

1.00 - Lunch

2.30 - Creative Media Workcamps – planning actions, making statements, plays, stories, photos, films etc.
1) Creative Writing and Telling Stories for Change
2) Creating Change through Food and Gardening
3) Boal’s Theatre of the Oppressed
4) Photography as a medium for Change
5) Video/ Film
6) Stunts
7) Art and Installation/ Badges and Banners

4.00 - Break

4.30 - 'Speak outs'

5.15 - Close

The programme on Day two - the 15th- will have broadly the same format with people being able to choose a different set of workcamps from those selected on Day one.

Day two will close at 4.00pm with a closing celebration and viewing of work achieved along with a ‘promise’ of one action arising out of work and discussions over the week-end.

Additional Activities
In addition to the structured workcamps we would like to invite people to come and share their skills, talents and ideas in a less formal way e.g. making music, performing / presenting plays and videos, doing art installations, staging activities for children. If you are interested in doing any of these, please contact kimcromwell AT rocketmail.com

Debate - Models for Social Change
There are now a wide range of initiatives and campaigns all aiming to reverse the cuts and set a direction for greater social justice and equality. Some rely on protesting, some on lobbying, and some on other strategies again. This session invites representatives of these different campaigns to discuss the thinking behind their different strategies and whether they are competing alternatives or complementary approaches. If you are interested in representing a particular initiative at this session, please contact mccrea.niamh AT gmail.com

by Interested Sat Jul 24, 2010 11:33

It sounds like a very constructive and positive thing ye are doing. May I ask who you are, what is the background of the organisers?

by Laurence Cox - Activist Fleadh Thu Jul 29, 2010 12:32

Hi Interested -

It's a fair question!

The quick answer is that the organising core is myself (NUI Maynooth MA in Community Education, Equality and Social Activism), Cathleen O'Neill (Kilbarrack CDP), Kim Cromwell (Kilbarrack CDP), Maureen Bassett (independent consultant on education and social development), Jean Bridgeman (Women of Insight, Kildare), Niamh McCrea (UCD Equality Studies), Augusta McDermott, Maura Gallagher (Langtrain Intercultural Training) and José Antonio Gutiérrez (Latin America Solidarity Centre). There are about another 20 people in a wider support group - mostly community activists, trade unionists, and supportive academics.

A basic policy is that this is "a process not a platform" - ie that the various sessions are designed to treat participants as equals and develop a discussion rather than have different groups trying to "sell their wares" (however important!) to each other. Ie the idea is for activists to be able to connect with each other across the big gulfs of different issues etc. in the context of the current crisis. It will be run very much on adult / community ed principles.

The background for the Fleadh comes out of a discussion following a talk to the UCD "Equality in a time of crisis" conference (available via http://www.ucd.ie/ewi/mariecurie/conference1.html) and an invitation from Cathleen O'Neill to those interested in the idea of an activist summer school to hold it in Kilbarrack.