‘Power before Program’: Broad Base Organizing and the Industrial Areas Foundation

Abstract

Five thousand leaders from broad-based community organizations gathered in San Antonio, Texas, on 7 November 1999 to celebrate 25 years of Industrial Areas Foundation (IAF) organizing in the southwest United States. They came by bus, plane and automobile from 27 cities and rural areas. They were united in one purpose: to build a base of power to represent the interests of their families and communities. The gathering of 5,000 leaders in turn had been built on thousands of house meetings, research actions, assemblies and direct actions conducted by Southwest IAF organizations. Some of the organizations, like Citizens Organizing for Public Service (COPS) in San Antonio, were decades old. Others like West Texas Organizing Strategy and Yuma County Interfaith Sponsoring Committee, only a year or two. All had a history of connecting community institutions like churches, synagogues, mosques, and schools together to organize for power. Each had built local leadership teams, raised budgets from membership dues to hire at least one professional organizer and established a track record of accomplishment.