A Shift in Organizing: Rochester Antiwar Activists Utilize the “Spokescouncil” Model

Antiwar activists in Rochester are experimenting with a different model of organizing for March 19, 2009, the sixth anniversary of the illegal war and occupation of Iraq (1, 2, 3, 4). It’s called a spokescouncil and it’s been around since at least the start of the global justice movement in Seattle in 1999 (1, 2).

According to Wikipedia, a spokescouncil is a “…collection of affinity groups and clusters (a collection of affinity groups), who meet together for a common purpose, often civil disobedience. A ‘spoke’ is short for a ‘spokesperson’, selected by each affinity group or cluster to represent them in the spokescouncil. The council usually makes decisions via a consensus decision making process.”

In recent years of organizing for March 19, activists and other concerned individuals have generally come to meetings hosted by larger, antiwar organizations such as Rochester Against War (RAW) or Metro Justice (MJ). Decision-making processes, goal setting, and strategy and tactics for March 19 were usually directed by those organizations while other organizations were asked to join the effort. Those that had alternative ideas were asked to subsume their goals for the larger organization’s goals in the spirit of unity in order to maintain a consistent message and accompanying action(s). This year could be a break from that type decision-making and organizing model for something different and as of yet, untried in Rochester.

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