Making Change Happen is a series of short publications about the strategies and ideas shaping social justice work produced by Just Associates in collaboration with various partners. Each publication takes on a different theme.
Making Change Happen was organized to explore an expanded view of advocacy and citizen participation. Organizers and participants were concerned about a tendency to view these activities as technical projects, devoid of power and politics. In reality, advocacy and civic participation involve a complex interaction of power and resistance, as those working for change in different contexts face different levels of openness and pluralism, risk and corruption. The workshop brought together innovative activists and thinkers to reclaim advocacy and citizen participation as deep and ongoing processes of organizing, consciousness raising, political empowerment and social transformation to benefit the poor and marginalized.
