Topic

Campaign Strategy

Campaign Strategy

Resources to enable groups to plan effective campaigns and other social change projects. These tools will help you assess the social and political situation, identify opportunities, map stakeholders, develop clear objectives, and come up with creative and powerful tactics.

You will find additional strategy guidance and inspiration in the case studies section.

Black and white photograph of a chess board with overturned king. The chess board and game is symbolic of Campaign Strategy Planning.

Campaign Strategy Planning Template

This planning template prompts you to apply a number of different campaign strategy, community organising, and civil resistance concepts and tools. Copy the template into your own document. As you complete each section delete the instructions (text in italics) until you have your own plan, or initial document to discuss in your organisation.

Elements of Campaign Strategy

This overview of campaign strategy elements is offered to clarify language shared by campaigners. The elements include campaign focus and goals; vision; situational analysis; critical path analysis; organisational considerations; allies, constituents and targets; objectives; tactics; evaluation and success indicators.

Cover of Original Power's Building Power Guide - features a drawing of a turtle in red.

The Building Power Guide

The Building Power guide is for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders who want to change the world. It includes several training resources to build capacity for campaigning, such as explorations of change-making, power, strategy and leadership development.

Cover of Gene Sharp's 'The Politics of Nonviolent Action: Part Two The Methods of Nonviolent Action'

198 Methods of Nonviolent Action by Gene Sharp

Stuck in a rut when it comes to campaign tactics? Explore Gene Sharp’s 198 methods of nonviolent action which are classified into three categories: nonviolent protest and persuasion, noncooperation (social, economic, and political), and nonviolent intervention.

A group of people stand on a bridge holding large letters spelling 'Global Goals'.

Tactics Analysis to Develop Campaign Strategy

A process guide to be used in training workshops and planning sessions to develop campaign strategy. Activists often love our tactics! We can even be wedded to our favourite tactics. Here’s a tool to help move from tactics to a larger strategy conversation by analysing tactics.

A collage of photographs taken with people featured on the ChangeMakers podcast.

Introduction to ChangeMakers Podcast

The ChangeMakers podcast is short series podcast that tells stories about people who are striving for social change across the world. This post introduces the series and includes the catalogue of episodes.

Cover of Tim Gee's book 'Counter Power: Making Change Happen'

Frameworks for Winning Change

Social change can be messy and challenging work! It helps to have frameworks to make sense of the situations we find ourselves in and plan for the way ahead. This article outlines four models, by Martin Luther King, Jr, George Lakey, Bill Moyer and Tim Gee.

Change Makers (Text on orange background)

Changemaker Chat with Paul Oosting from GetUp: Elections and Politics

GetUp is one of Australia’s most impactful and influential community organisations, and Paul Oosting is their national director. We discuss what GetUp learnt from the 2019 Federal Election campaign. We find out Paul’s insights about what it’s like to operate under the pressure of media and political attack.

red balloon tied to metal weight

Moving the rock: Shifting power for sustained change

This article explores the ‘moving the rock’ concept put forward by Daniel Hunter in his book Strategy and Soul. The concept has been valuable for campaigners and organisations reassessing their theory of change and particularly how they engage politicians and supporters.

Photograph of a number of paper plates laid out on the ground with a person pointing at one. The plates have writing on them describing campaign steps.

Critical Path Analysis Process Guide

A process guide to be used in training workshops and planning sessions to develop campaign strategy. Critical path analysis can shift focus to outcomes rather than tactics and provide experience and skill in defining clear objectives. The process also deepens understanding about how change happens and clarifies key threads running through a campaign.

Photograph of hand drawn letters in blue and black on a white background. The word is 'Change'.

Elements of a Theory of Change

Getting clear on our theory of change can be personally empowering as well as important for alignment within organisations and campaigns. These notes are from a workshop by Naomi Blackburn, drawing on the Resource Manual for a Living Revolution and Australian Student Environment Network curriculum.

People walk across an open square. The ground is painted with a calendar depicting days of the week and dates.

Tactical Timeline Guide to Develop Campaign Strategy

A process guide to be used in training workshops and planning sessions to develop campaign strategy. A tactical timeline can support the development of a strategy designed to win over third-party support. This exercise needs to be used after the spectrum of allies exercise.

Diagram with two intersecting axis. The horizontal line is marked 'Strongly oppose your objective' on the left and 'Strongly support your objective' on the right. The vertical axis is marked 'More power & influence' at the top and 'Less power & influence' at the bottom.

Power Mapping Guide

A process guide to be used in training workshops and planning sessions to help campaigners consider the social and political context within which they are developing strategy and creatively consider allies, opponents, targets and constituents prior to embarking on a campaign.

text reads 'how to cut the issue into bite sized chunks'. There is an icon of scissors cutting a dotted straight line under the heading.

How to Cut the Issue into Bite Sized Chunks

A process guide to be used in training workshops and planning sessions to develop campaign strategy. This process will help reduce the scope of campaigns in order to focus efforts on where change can really be achieved, and consider the possible consequences of working on one part of a problem rather than others.

Pin It on Pinterest