I'll quote from a saint here:"Words lead to deeds... They prepare the soul, make it ready, and move it to tenderness."
That's Saint Teresa of Avila. I read it for the first time as an epigraph to Raymond Carver's poetry collection A New Path to the Waterfall.
In hopes of turning words to deeds, I'm joining up with some other concerned citizens to create an action circle on salmon, based on the study-action circle model. It was used effectively by social change luminary Joanna Macy on nuclear power plant issues— and also by early labour unions, South American liberation theologists and the civil rights movement. It's a solid model, I think, for engaging regular citizens on complex and tough social issues. I encountered it through the Be the Change Earth Alliance and wrote on it for a local Vancouver magazine called Granville, here.
As Joanna Macy told me once in an interview:
"I think the study action group is the great invention, the great social technology invented in the 20th century. It helps people take responsibility, and it’s deeply democratic.... In my experience this builds not only insight and understanding, but confidence. Confidence because you realize there are not really experts out there that you have to find and trust and obey, but that we are all— we all have to be— experts."Macy was very enthusiastic about study-action circles, and we talked for 15 minutes or so on them. More from the interview if you click "Read Full Post" below.
Of study-action circles, Macy said:
"[We all work] with each other so we can all become very informed, and harvest insights about how things are interrelated. So that in the study action groups that we did for several years on nuclear waste, we ended up giving presentations, to schools, testifying in hearings at the Department of Energy... So if there’s something that you’re learning together, you’re learning it in order to be able to do something effective."With an eye to effective deeds, rather than simply cathartic ones, we've started this first citizen-run Wild Salmon Circle. Our goal is to learn about the issue and see where we want to put our shoulder to the wheel, once we each discover what we feel are real leverage points: whether lawsuits or sit-ins or marches or consumer boycotts or documentary films.
This initial group is looking at the salmon farming side of wild salmon conservation. This issue has dragged on too long and people like Alexandra Morton and others have devoted their lives to it, but never quite gotten the leverage they need-- partly because regular citizens who care about salmon and other wild fish haven't pitched in beyond signatures and donations. If all goes well, this group will be a pilot for similar groups in other places across BC. The plan is to meet regularly over the next few months to educate ourselves with help from various experts (so far, Living Oceans and Alexandra Morton have agreed to help us) and figure out what we want to do, as individuals or as a group.
Study-action circles max out at 12 people. As it stands now, we appear to be at a little over half that. If you live in the Greater Vancouver area and would like to join or learn more, send me an email at tbridge at shaw dot ca.
Viva la revolution, eh.
The painting of returning salmon above is called The Hero's Journey. It was painted by Carver's friend Alfredo Arreguin, and was featured on the cover of A New Path to the Waterfall. You can click the painting to see some of his other work.
What makes a study-action group really effective in responding to this rather grand crisis that we’re facing?
In my own experience, small group work— study circles, or what I have come to call study-action circles— are a mainstay for social change on the personal level. They certainly kept me committed and have been the avenue of tremendous learning. A task force, one that changed my life, a small group that changed my life, was on a legal action, a people’s intervention against a nuclear power plant that was not following through on the regulations they had signed on to. We had a very particular job to do.
Generalizing from that, it helped me take myself seriously, when I knew I could count on the others and they knew they could count on me, and we each had a job to do. And so, most of the small groups, the grassroots actions that have been activated by people coming together in their neighbourhoods and in their communities .. the sense of commitment and trust relates to the sense of time. How much time am I committing to this? What am I letting myself in for?
It’s become clear to me that when I invite others to join me in a study action group or any venture, I don’t just leave it open-ended, like you’re just signing on forever. Like, would you be interested in getting together with me every month for five months? Or would you like to meet twice a month for three months.
And I think that has been part of the success of the NW Earth Institute, you know you’re coming to a meeting together for 8 sessions. Then people are much more willing and you can rely on each other. I can’t say enough for what these circles or small groups have meant in my life, and what I see them bringing forth for other people as well.
It brings a sense of self-respect, that I can commit to something and follow through. I see that Be the Change, why I’m excited about Maureen’s overall goals, is that it’s not just helping people meet in large gatherings and get souped up over the excitement and exhilaration that can happen in a large gathering, but make it part of their lives. So they can feel accountable to a group, and sustained by a group— feel themselves known, feel themselves seen, and feel themselves rewarded by what they discover about themselves.
There were two such experiences in my life, each one was several years long, and though they started out time defined, we would extend it. I found that it grew a lot of comprehension and knowledge, and we found that we became knowledgeable and insight broke through, because we could focus in on a subject matter that we were learning together. With bite size pieces, that people could handle in a 2 or 3 hour meeting.
One was in Washington DC where we used to live, we did several study groups on macroeconomics, where everybody had something they agreed to read before they came together, and I think that’s a feature of the NW Earth Institute. There’s a lot of groups out there like this now, and in fact I think the study action group is the great invention, the great social technology invented in the 20th century. It was invented first in Denmark as I understand it. It helps people take responsibility, and it’s deeply democratic.
Democratic and empowering, because the way we did it, we would have rotating facilitator-ship. Our term would come and then we would be running the meeting and be in charge of what we did, another would be in charge of the hospitality, then step into the role of facilitator at the next meeting. In my experience this builds not only insight and understanding, but confidence. Confidence because you realize there are not really experts out there that you have to find and trust and obey, but that we are all— we all have to be— experts.
We all have to become them, or we all already are them?
Well, in a way, both. It’s like the Buddhist teaching of the bodhisattva. You become one, but in a deep sense you already are one. That you are the experts on what it’s like to be living on an endangered planet, and knowing that our air and water isn’t safe… these are— we know them from the soles of our feet, we know that in our guts. On the other hand, with each other we can all become very informed, and harvest insights about how things are interrelated. So that in the study action groups that we did for several years on nuclear waste, we ended up giving presentations, to schools, testifying in hearings at the Department of Energy.Read Full Post
So my experience is that that confidence that comes, that excitement that’s built, that courage that comes, is when the members of a group decide on an action together. Whether it’s taking a petition around or leafleting at a meeting or at the supermarket or whatever— this builds tremendous esprit de corps.
