Power and Balance
No matter if we just started to move towards collective organizing or if we have been organized for years, again and again we are reminded that the asymmetrical power relations we want to leave behind find their ways back into our structures. Instead of blanking them out in the hope that they will vanish as undefinably as they emerged we want to invite those eager to soften and transform them to acknowledge their presence and turn towards them. As we do this, the interconnectedness of our personal experiences, the political conditions we live in and the structures we establish collectively become evident. Our response must involve all those dimensions.
To us this means first of all practicing accountability and vulnerability, with a willingness to listen to each other and unlearn. When we integrate collective reflection processes as ritual or routine into our doing we can change the way we relate to each other.
The 48 Cards are the temporary result of numerous conversations and negotiation processes, different people and collectives have informed them. Yet the set is by nature incomplete and many perspectives and aspects are missing. Each set therefore contains 12 blank cards for the questions you might like to add. If you want to share them with us they can become part of a future edition.
How can they be used?
First and importantly they can be used in whatever way gives you insight or joy, experiment! We invite you to look at the cards as impulses. They are often (just) doors into fields, that require depth. Try to give space to the questions and thoughts they may set in motion.
Some things that worked well so far:
- doing a round where everyone can answers the question,
- spliting in smaller groups of three or four to discuss them more,
- taking the question with you on a walk alone or in pairs.
Often people take very different amounts of time and space to speak, it might be interesting to try out setting a timer with the same time for everyone to speak.
Aditionally there are dutch, russian, italian and czech translations available online (so far).
If you are missing a specific language and/or would be open to translate please do so and contact us. Also If you have further resources, ideas and links you want to share.
For critique, thoughts and questions you can write to: contact
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Project credits
This project is released thanks to the support of:
organizing otherwise 2024 – contact@organizingotherwise.org – impressum