spectrum of allies
Blog: Civil resistance runs on people power: How to shift allegiances
Powerful opponents seem to have everything: money, guns, supplies, the army and police, institutions and prisons. How can simple citizens, with scarce resources and unarmed, succeed against opponents wielding deadly weapons? “Look at us,” you say, “we are no match.”
Find out about how nonviolent struggle can achieve victory, in large part by shifting alliegeances among three main groups of people.
Blog: Move your allies: a new group exercise on strategy

So you've taken the time to survey your social landscape. Your organization has figured which constituencies are your natural friends and which are your opponents, and the various groups in between. You have run the Spectrum of Allies. Now what?
How do you decide what to do? How do you identify the key constituencies on which to focus your limited energies? If winning means moving different segments in your general direction, however slightly, how can you collectively develop tailor-made arguments and tactics that target these particular slices of the social pie you want to pull over to your side?
Here's a recently developed workshop exercise, a shiny new strategy tool to help your gang define next steps in campaign design. It includes step-by-step instructions, so you can facilitate the tool with some confidence in your group.
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Blog: Know your Allies: A Strategy Tool

Click for full view. Original graphic from Movement for New Society.
"It might have been prudent at the beginning to identify potential groups that would oppose the movement, and solicit their support, but we did not anticipate such opposition."
— Emile Short in Powerful Persuasion
“The media”, I asked, “where should we put the media?”
“Somewere in the middle”, said someone in the group. “No, the media's more like a hostile neutral”, said another.
As I moved the marker across a crescent shape drawn on the flip chart, we settled on a wedge between Neutrals and Opponents.
Blog: Learning by doing 301: From tactics to strategy
cc Philippe Duhamel, interTactica.org
Why is a strategy important? Having a strategy helps you keep the initiative in your hands, enhance your ability to see opportunities, use your strengths to the best advantage, and minimize your weaknesses.
— from Why Strategy and Tactics?, available here at NewTactics.
Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics
without strategy is the noise before defeat.
— Sun Tzu
What is strategy in relation to tactics? How does the strategist differ from the tactician? Find out some of the steps towards designing a good strategy. Third in a three-part series on moving from activity, to tactics, to strategy.

