Written by Sara Fromm, movement worker at WfGA.
Our former management Sara Fromm has published a book. We can look in.
Climate crisis. Right. Upgrade. Crisis, as far as the eye is concerned. And it just seems to be getting worse. When I last year Lendelion Verlag I was asked whether I would like to write a book on the topic of "climate crisis and work", I thought: an exciting topic – but what it really needs is, above all, practical action to advance the urgently necessary social changes.
Individual changes in consumption or behaviour are not sufficient. What we need to do instead – and the workshop has been supporting for 50 years – is political action. To act together, to organize us and to empower ourselves in the end. And as strategic as possible. During my time, I was able to learn a lot as a managing director at the workshop, but also now as a freelance employee. And that's why I'd rather write a book about it, hoping that there is courage and confidence – and moving people to action.
Reading sample from ‘Confidence now – bravely encountering the crises of the world“:
I'm still seeing a young woman being dragged away from police over the asphalt. The police are gradually working: the blockade we built on the bridge in the middle of Madrid this morning with our bodies. We are here because we are calling for a different transport and climate policy from the government in Madrid and Spain. Because all the demonstrations and petitions have so far not brought much, today, in 2019, we are sitting on the streets on a Saturday morning at the first mass campaign of the climate justice movement in Spain. Before me, someone starts shouting loudly: "Show me what democracy looks like!" and we answer in the voice song: "This is what democracy looks like!"
I'm getting nervous when looking at the police: in which the patience thread is torn or never had one – and directly with bums and pain grips. While I repeatedly call "This is what democracy looks like" and thus show my confidence in democracy and the fact that our protest is part of this negotiation process, it hails pain grips around me. How cynical, shoot my head. Democracy can also look like this – if false values are enforced by violence and peaceful protests will counter the entire broad side of state violence.
Successes are not linear progress. Social movements do not always take steps forward. Instead, 'Lowers are part of our path', as Timo Luthmann put it. And there are phases in which social movements have more success than in other times. These phases can be reflected with different concepts, such as the 'years' of the Ayni Institute or Bill Moyer's 'Movement Action Plan'.
Social movements are the key to progressive social-ecological change. For the changes we need so urgently in our society, we must work together to organize ourselves for this. We all can and should be part of social movements. And for topics that are particularly close to our hearts, not only enter the electoral booth, but also on the street. Without people who have done exactly this in the past, we would not be where we are now. Without the fights of the women's right movement, I could not go to vote today. Without the workers, the 5-day week would be unthinkable.
Das Tolle daran? Wir können von unseren Vorgänger:innen lernen. Wir müssen das Rad nicht komplett neu erfinden, sondern können von den Erfahrungen anderer profitieren. Dafür lohnt sich ein Blick auf einige erfolgreiche Beispiele aus den letzten Jahrzehnten: die US-amerikanische Bürgerrechtsbewegung, die deutsche Anti-Atomkraft-Bewegung und die argentinische feministische Bewegung.
