Distributed Organizing Guide

Introduction

Blueprints for Change how-to guides are put together by campaign innovators in order to help progressive organizers and groups up their game more quickly. The “blueprints” capture, communicate and inform innovative campaigning strategies and tactics. You can download BfC’s guides as pdfs from the Commons (see the box at the bottom of the page) or view the evolving Google docs.

Summary

Distributed organizing (as opposed to community organizing or traditional political organizing) activates a network of self-starting supporters/campaigners in multiple locations, which can spread across geographical boundaries, interests and cultural groups. It draws on the initiative and energy of volunteer organizers to start groups and lead teams with varying degrees of autonomy. Though more horizontal when compared to traditional “command and control” leadership, distributed organizing often relies on a central coordination group to launch the network and to drive it towards common goals and milestones. When done properly, it can help a movement or campaign scale rapidly and channel huge amounts of collective power.

Blueprints for Change provide their guides in Google Doc format to be able to update their blueprints with the latest information. See the latest version.

Contents

• Disclaimer / request for your help 2
• Summary 2
• Who’s doing it? 2
• Impact/ Why do this? 3
• When this might not work for you 5
• What this requires (people, resources, etc.) 6
• Setup + stages 8
• Tricky parts + fixes 14
• Further resources 17
• Who can help with this? 18
• Attribution 18

Explore Further

• The Definitive Distributed Organizing Guide – Distributed Organizing Guide and webinar about its potential for winning electoral campaigns, how to do it, and how to find more information.
• Blueprints for Change: Sample Distributed Action Plan – This provides a breakdown of the key considerations for planning a distributed program. This series of questions to ask yourself is a great help when planning your distributed program.
• NetChange: The six building blocks of distributed organizing campaigns – This is a great checklist with worksheets to make sure you have covered everything and asked yourself the right questions in planning a distributed organizing program.
• Decentralised control – A list of resources on decentralized organizing.
• How to Build a Team: Online Course by Marshall Ganz – A full course from Marshall Ganz on building teams through leadership.
• What is Organizing? An Introduction based on the Work of Marshall Ganz. An excellent and comprehensive guide to organizing practices based on the work of Marshall Ganz.
• Ayni Institute: SWARM Training (Decentralized Organization) – This is a series of eight trainings on YouTube from the Anyi Institute which go deep into the essential components of decentralized organizing.