It’s how we do what we do that will make change…
Better Way is a wonderful collective set up to shift power, including in the UK charity sector. Its principles around building on strengths, collaboration, deeper relationships and beyond will be critical to change systems.
On 29th November I had the privilege of sitting in the audience for Better Way's Call to Action launch at the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation.
In the panel discussion there was recognition that all we do with and on behalf of service users must be political. I interpreted this to mean political with a small ‘p’ and how we use our power to understand and engage with the world around us with social justice at the heart of our decisions and actions. We should see all of our services synonymous with our campaigns. This might be a step change for many of us, but without that understanding we will do ‘to’ people, develop programmes without an agenda for real systemic change and, by default, support a broken system that upholds social injustice.
Where it gets trickier is the how... there were some wonderful examples of great practice and change from Shelter and Cambridge House. Examples of devolving leadership, of engaging service users, of politicising staff. These are great examples from organisations that have started on this journey and are really feeling the impact for the people for whom they exist.
In Turn2Us we aspire to co-produce programmes with people who have faced financial hardship. We are stepping our toe in the water with one of our most used services, our Benefits Calculator (an online tool to enable people to understand what means-tested benefits they are entitled to). We hope and expect to have our power challenged, to be held to account as we re-design the tool designed with and for whom it is meant to benefit. With such a powerful tool in our hands – we need to engage with people to understand how we politicise that. We know that in the current climate accessing benefits is not enough; how can and should we work with people who use our calculator to raise their voice, to challenge power, to hold us and others to account?
We must all get better at shifting and sharing power. With the current context we are all working in, we can either recognise that we must give up power, or wait for it to be taken from us. How many women who have fought for justice have been given permission by a man for that power to be taken....we have taken the power in all places where we are starting to move towards greater equality. As Audre Lorde so eloquently put it: “For the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. They may allow us to temporarily beat him at his own game, but they will never enable us to bring about genuine change.” There is no difference in the work we do as charities, no matter who we exist for - if at the heart of it all is equality and social justice - power must be demanded, taken, and created in new places - and we need to be ready for that.
To be more ready to shift and share power we know we must be accountable to the people our services exist for. Polly Neate from Shelter said beautifully that we must learn to be accountable for things we cannot control. That is critical. If we accept that accountability is the responsible use of power, let’s understand our power, and work with civil society to create robust accountability mechanisms that will enable us to have tough conversations, to reflect on whether we are doing the right thing, to allow people to hold us to account. In turn that accountability will stretch to other organisations who exist to serve people, and naturally to those with formal power over our lives. Political accountability is inevitably and already at the heart of our campaigns, but let us make it part of everything we do, from setting budgets, to programme design, to safeguarding to fundraising.
None of our organisations are perfect, we must continue to learn and we should be proud of our work, yet humble about the small differences we are making as the big changes are made by people themselves in their own lives – we are there only to facilitate that. However, until we embrace our work as a political agenda, and until people stop being grateful for the small amount we do and hold it as their right to have a home, have a job, have food, we cannot be part of a collective movement for change. Let us learn how to do that better together.
Sonya Ruparel is the Director of Programmes and Partnerships at Turn2Us.
