You asked for it and we listened. One of our takeaways from the Listening Tour was that you want more trainings, opportunities to share best practices on organizing, or to discuss topics that will contextualize our work in the broader movement space.
For our first event, we’ll dive into a conversation about systemic oppression, white supremacy, and how these forces show up in our lives and in our organizing.
We’ll hear from special guest Chris Crass, who will talk about systemic oppression and white supremacy, and how these forces show up in our lives. There will be room for questions and discussion at the end.
Read MoreThe original Indivisible Guide focused on how to act locally to influence your elected officials. This guide focuses on how to act locally to replace them.
What we wrote in the Guide nearly a year ago remains true today: Trump’s agenda doesn’t depend on Trump, but rather on whether your elected officials go along with him or resist. Indivisible groups in every congressional district in the country have taken that to heart.
Your local application of constituent power has, incredibly, altered the national political landscape. Ten months in, Trump’s plutocratic, white supremacist cabal has yet to enact a single significant piece of legislation. Instead, a ragtag bunch of volunteers just doing their civic duty on their home turf have won a breathtaking series of victories.
But you know these victories aren’t final. To stop the Trump agenda of racism, authoritarianism, and plutocracy, we have to take back power.
Read MorePress releases, media advisories, and statements are formal communication tools that your group can use to get its messages out to media. Think of them as the type of communication you have with reporters that goes out on your organization’s nice letterhead stationery. Ideally, they’re just one way that you’re in touch with your media contacts and great tools to have in your toolbox.
Read MoreLasting change can only be assured through electoral wins. This guide will give you the background on campaigns and elections you need to get involved in electoral politics for the first time.
Read MoreAs your Indivisible group sends down roots and becomes an institution in your community, it's worth putting some time into developing strong long-term relationships with the media in your area.
The Indivisible network is lucky to have some great group leaders who have professional backgrounds in media themselves. We've gotten their personal takes on what makes someone a great and easy-to-work-with “source.” (That’s you!) We also asked them how they've incorporated that knowledge into their work as media points-of-contact for their Indivisible groups.
Read MoreIn our introduction to inclusivity, we set out why we all need to make inclusivity a core focus of our advocacy and set out some practical steps on how to embed inclusivity into our groups.
This document will set out guidelines for how to build inclusive partnerships, including who you can and should be reaching out to, and how to build trust and show respect when reaching out.
Read MoreDonald Trump’s victory in November was shocking to many of us, but it did not come out of nowhere. It could only have happened in a society that has consistently devalued the lives and dignity of historically marginalized groups, such as people of color, immigrants, queer people, and women. This means that resistance cannot consist just of fighting back against Trump. Rather we have to work to overturn the patterns of injustice that helped Trump rise to power.
Therefore, a core Indivisible principle is that we must model the value of inclusion in our work and challenge efforts to silence the voices of people who have been marginalized or excluded. Being inclusive is an acknowledgment of the injustices that have brought us to this point. It is an investment in the durability and solidarity of our communities and in the efficacy of our work. And it is a rejection of the idea that any of us deserves to remain vulnerable or to be left out of the conversation.
Read MoreIn the wake of the domestic terrorist attack and white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, VA, it is important that we take a critical look at our role in dismantling systems of oppression. This document includes initial things to do in your groups and your community, but is just a start.
Read MoreThe Indivisible Project and The OpEd Project are excited to be publishing this joint resource.
The OpEd Project's mission is to increase the range of voices and quality of ideas we hear in the world, with a focus on increasing the number of underrepresented voices and thought leaders in influential public forums. The Indivisible Project’s mission is to equip locally-led groups across the country with tools to hold their Members of Congress accountable and resist the Trump agenda.
Our missions overlap. We both believe that the right voices speaking up at the right time can have a big impact on decision makers. And we both believe that our democracy is full of untapped expertise and potential.
Read MoreLetters to the editor might not seem like the flashiest way to get your Member of Congress’s attention. But there’s something about a sharp letter to the editor in a hometown paper that can really get under the skin of the most powerful lawmaker.
In this resource, we will cover:
Why your MoC cares about letters to the editor
How to submit a letter to the editor
Some tricks to make sure your letter really leaves an impression with your MoC’s office
Read MorePartnerships can be useful for a lot of different reasons. Maybe you need policy support or data/graphics for some work you’re doing, and another group has the experts who can help you. Maybe you’re having a rally and you want to be sure that lots of people will show up. Maybe you are conscious of the demographics of your own group, and you want to work on issues where other people’s voices should be front and center.
But partnerships are also about mutual benefit and mutual respect between two organizations. At their core, partnerships are about relationships—and long term partnerships require building trust in the same way that relationships do.
Read MoreYou’ve heard us say it before, but we’ll say it again: this is a marathon, not a sprint. The key to success is to keep showing up, but we know it’s easy to get overwhelmed by how much is going on and how much there is to do. Here are a few tips on how to make advocacy a habit—and keep it fun and engaging in the months ahead!
Read MoreDifferent groups communicate with each other or store information in different ways. And just like steps to ensure physical security, it’s important to consider the risks you and your group might be facing—or might not. Many security measures require compromises in terms of the ease of communication or cost to an organization’s institutional memory. Being secure is less convenient than just doing nothing, and the goal should be to identify what’s most important to you and your group, and focus on what you can effectively do to secure that, rather than devising an iron-clad system that’s impossible to use.
Read MoreAs we discuss in the Indivisible Guide, every MoC has one or more local offices, but constituents very rarely visit them. The Tea Party understood this, and they knew they could make their voice heard by going in person to those offices, often unannounced. This seems simple, but it can have an enormous impact—the whole congressional staff will be talking about that group that showed up and demanded answers about Trump’s agenda. It also demonstrates to them that you, their constituents, care very much about the issue you’ve come in to speak about and that you’ll be watching what they do going forward.
Read MoreIndivisible groups across the country did an incredible job resisting the Trump agenda during the first 100 days. But we know this is a marathon not a sprint—we have a lot of work ahead of us! We’ve heard repeatedly that groups are planning ahead and thinking through how to keep members motivated.
This document covers strategies for group and team leaders to prevent burnout and keep group members motivated for the long haul.
Read MoreOne of the things we learned as former congressional staffers is that Congress really only has the bandwidth to handle one or a few things at once. Sure, there’ll be plenty of speeches, hearings, and press conferences, but usually Congress is really only focusing on one or two issues at a given time. That gives Indivisible groups the power to focus energy into those things that really matter.
We all know that Trump poses an existential threat to this country. No matter what your issue is—whether it’s health care, immigration, the environment, civil rights, or something else—it is under attack by Trump and his cronies in Congress. A tactic they’re using is to spread our movement as thinly as possible, hoping that we don’t have the energy or the fortitude to keep fighting. We're going to prove them wrong.
However, the fact is that we still have to prioritize what we focus on in a given moment in order to maximize our impact. The question isn’t WHAT issue we care most about, it’s HOW we can have impact. Ultimately, we can't respond to everything, and we don't want to. Let us explain.
Read MoreMany Indivisible groups have a single leader: the person who registered the group on Indivisible’s website, who first put out the call for his or her neighbors to participate, who led the first meeting. But a single leader can’t effectively lead an Indivisible group for long. You need a leadership team to be successful. Here are just a few reasons why:
So who would be a good member of your leadership team? Find out in this resource!
Read MoreWith vibrant, diverse, and passionate members but limited time, we know that it can sometimes be tough to make decisions efficiently. This guide covers four ways that your group could use to help reach decisions:
This resource also discusses electing leaders and promoting diversity in leadership, as well as digital communication tools. However, it’s worthwhile to highlight here that our number one tip is not to rely too much on digital communications to make decisions: if you can, meet in person or pick up the phone. Decisions are a lot easier if you can talk.
Regardless of what tools you use, remember to record the decisions as you make them—check out our How to Run a Meeting guide for a sample action item and decision tracker. It’s also good practice to review the list of actions and decisions that you have recorded at the end of the meeting.
Read MoreThanks to Trump and his crazy cronies, we all have a lot to do these days! Building up the size of your local group is essential to effectively #standindivisible. Whether it’s to increase your capacity to tackle your goals, to make sure your group reflects the amazing diversity of your community, or to demonstrate the strength of your opposition, you need to be recruiting.
To help you grow your group, this document shares some best practices around member recruitment.
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Indivisible Austin is a chapter of the grassroots movement based on the principles outlined in the Indivisible Guide. This document was originally posted on Indivisible Austin's website here. Read Indivisible Guide’s Town Hall Tip Sheet, which has great advice on Town Halls with your Member of Congress. Most of this guide applies to “mock” or “ghost” Town Halls that your MoC does not attend.
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