Section 5: Stories
The following are a few vignettes about groups working to create a more just world and struggling with conflict. To protect the confidentiality of actual groups who have had similar experiences, we have created composites of many years of stories intended to demonstrate the key themes around conflict in the framework. They represent the very real struggles of many groups trying to sort out how to work through hard stuff and come out the other side intact.
MEMBERSHIP-BASED GROUP
A member who was also a longstanding informal leader in the group called out the formal leadership for bias and favoritism in assigning leadership roles or giving credit to members. The member did this calling-out publicly, at a meeting, and then followed up in the group’s social media channels. This generated a flurry of response from other members, some of whom began to organize in support of the member who did the initial calling out. Leaders’ written response asking for time to explore and understand the critique further inflamed a group of members, who named specific leaders as the primary offenders. Leaders were not in agreement about how to proceed, factions developed, and two key leaders left the group.
COALITION 1
The staff of a coalition of groups largely driven by youth advocates ran into conflict about what it meant to be accountable to the community. When called to be more transparent about the coalition’s finances, there was fierce disagreement amongst the staff around how much to disclose about money they had taken in and how it had been spent. Ultimately a decision was made, but few were really happy with it. Consensus was arrived at more out of exhaustion than from a true understanding of each other’s interests. Information was shared with the community, and some community members were angry that it didn’t reveal the full picture they believed should have been disclosed. When called to defend their decision, many younger staff members found themselves unable to do so, which frustrated or angered older staff, given that it was a consensus decision. The coalition continued its work with an underlying level of internal tension and a persistent current of mistrust in the community.
COALITION 2
This coalition was loosely united by the commitment to stopping violence perpetrated against members of their community. People sidestepped disagreements over tactics to join in organizing and direct action. Latent differences surfaced over the public statements of an immigrant group leader, herself undocumented, who claimed to speak on behalf of the other undocumented people in the coalition. Some were worried that her inflammatory language would get in the way of a campaign victory which they saw as imminent. They also feared that the leader’s provocation was too risky for activists who were undocumented. While many saw the leader’s statements as tactically risky, people were not united in how to respond. Some felt strongly that as a person directly affected by the violence, the leader and other undocumented people should be trusted to assess their own risk; some felt that the leader was ego-driven and not actually representing the views of others directly affected, and therefore should be challenged; some felt that there should be a challenge, but that it should only come from BIPOC or immigrant members of the coalition. Before these disagreements could be resolved, an explosive fight broke out between the leader along with her allies on one side, and those who didn’t trust her leadership on the other. The coalition didn’t survive this fight.
COALITION 3
After a very successful launching campaign, disagreements in a coalition erupted at their first planning retreat. Tensions had been brewing during the previous campaign between two cohorts: some Black members of the coalition who were older, cisgender -male, straight, and formerly incarcerated. They had no clear, strong organizational base but were great spokespeople for the issues; and a group of other white members (some cis -women, straight and queer) who come from more well-resourced, professionalized organizations. The Black formerly incarcerated leaders had a hit-or-miss track record of showing up to meetings and following through on agreed-upon commitments. At the retreat, they accused white coalition members of taking up too much power and space in the coalition and that decisions and strategy were not driven enough by the interests of Black incarcerated people. They explained their focus on grassroots organizing as their main priority. White leaders viewed the Black leaders as unreliable partners in the work, and felt left to pick up their slack, but were also sensitive to the need for Black leadership in the coalition. They struggled with how to be accomplices and were hesitant to push their critique directly with the Black members at the retreat. Unable to resolve this dynamic, after the retreat the coalition hobbled along for a few months and then dissipated.
ORGANIZATION
The organization has an anti- oppression lens and has committed to centering the voices of people directly affected by oppressive systems and policies, both internally and in their work. Affinity groups for BIPOC and queer staff support one another and have pushed the organization to address intersectional issues that affected their communities. A virtual forum was organized, billed as a “healing opportunity to hear one another’s stories.” At that session, a Black cisgender participant, while speaking in very personal ways about her experience of systemic racism, included language that was interpreted by some queer participants as transphobic. A fairly awkward attempt by a white, trans participant to name this was seen as insensitive. Other queer, white participants joined in trying to expain. Vocal BIPOC participants reacted angrily, and queer BIPOC participants spoke of the pain of having to choose between their queer and BIPOC identities in the context of this conversation. After some heated back and forth, someone said this was not a safe space, and about half the participants left the meeting, effectively ending the forum.
There are many stories like these. What they have in common is getting stuck when a conflict emerges and not having the tools to navigate it without rupture. It is possible to work through each of these scenarios in a way that maintains relationship and connection, while being real about what matters to each party in the conflict. The tools here will help you do that.