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Bridging the Empowerment to Strategy Gap

One important outcome of the research was identifying that the co-researchers all had a had experiences of collective empowerment and agency in their activist practices and what our holistic workshops enabled us to realise was that strategy was a key need for them moving forward

During the ULEX training I came across a diagram created by Leticia Nieto and Margot F. Boyer (2006) below, about Experience of Empowerment in organisations. The diagram came from the article Understanding Oppression strategies in addressing power and privilege. Second Instalments: Skills Sets for Targets (Nieto and Boyer, 2006).

Nieto and Boyers Diagram- Empowerment in Organisations

Leticia Nieto and Margot Boyer (2006) - Experiences on Empowerment in Organisations

Though concerned with experiences within organisations, I found the diagram reflected the co-researchers’ experiences. Firstly, many were living in a sort of survival mode, some had housing difficulties, income struggles or health problems. Secondly, confusion abounded in the workshop practice generated from a frustration about what to do about the issues we are facing generally, and secondly with regard to the co-produced context of the research praxis. Thirdly, there had been mixed experiences of collective empowerment. The fourth point on the diagram, strategy, was an area that co-researchers had less experience of, but a clear interest in moving from empowerment into strategic action. I felt the final part of the diagram, the re-centering stage, would be a very difficult action for individual activists to achieve unless they had some way to reconnect. To visualise these observations, I created the diagram below

Co-researcher experince of strategy gap
EMpowerment strategy map middle_edited.p

Building on Leticia Nieto and Margot Boyer (2006) - Empowerment in Organisations.

Diagram by G. Harvey: Empowerment to Strategy Gap: based on participant and co-researcher workshop feedback and really useful questions about power and strategy and the gap between where they are now and where they would like to be.  

Bridging the strategy gap
EMpowerment strategy map lrg_edited.jpg

Building on Leticia Nieto and Margot Boyer (2006) Diagram - Empowerment in Organisations.

Diagram by G. Harvey: Bridging the Empowerment to Strategy Gap between activists and organisations., Can we to link-up? 

Part 2 Nieto, L., & Boyer, M. F. (2006, October). Understanding Oppression: Strategies in addressing power and privilege, second installment, skill sets for Targets. Colors NW Magazine, 6, 48-51.

Resources

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