Who wants to elect a Green MP?

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By Matthew Piggott on 1 June 2009 - 8:29pm

What can the Green Party do to set the stage to elect our first MPs?

First the context:  The Green Party is the only party that will take action on the environment for the climate, the economy, and for our health.  The Liberals have taken a sharp turn under Ignatieff, the NDP does well but have fallen short at times (union ties, carbon tax), and the Progressive Conservative side is almost non-existent in the current Conservative government. There are elements of green thinking in other parties (and we should collaborate wherever possible), but if we want to see real change then we need to assert our own political power.  Then we’ll actually get decision makers to listen.

Second, if there was proportional representation Greens would be elected right away.  We got 7% of the vote in the last election and close to 1 million votes.  But, electoral reform does not seem to be on the immediate radar at the federal level and has recently been turned down (although the process was extremely flawed) at the provincial level in British Colombia and Ontario.  So, we need to be able to win under the current First Past the Post system.  In fact, having Green MPs will probably help accelerate the electoral reform movement.

So how do we do this? I’ll admit that with only a small amount of experience my opinion may not be authoritative.  But from what I’ve seen if we start a process called COMMUNITY ORGANIZING, then we’ll be on the right track to electing MPs. This may take awhile for people to understand and implement but in the long term it will bring us success (and Greens get the long term right?).

Below is some BACKGROUND MATERIAL on community organizing so we’re all on the same page and “speaking the same language.” I’ll try to do a brief summary here. Community organizing is a process of connecting citizens’ everyday needs and concerns to the political system through collective action. This starts with a social survey whereby interested groups and decision makers in a community are identified and approached (think as broadly as possible).  You will be building a network of interested people, some who are already part of groups (churches, service clubs, community organizations)  i.e. “the grassroots.”  Practically this involves building volunteer networks, obtaining contact info for identified supporters, making lists of community leaders, and meeting with as many people in your community as you possibly can.  A great election event would be to have your candidate meet all of these leaders.  Running a campaign starts way before the 30 day writ period, but being prepared will make all the difference.

READING/VIEWING MATERIAL:

What I’m talking about can be best understood with some context and background knowledge:

First, for those who learn best through video can view this link called,
“The Meaning of Community Organizing”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NElvLp4Oyr0&NR=1

Bill Hulet has created a slide show on community organizing that gives a good introduction:

http://www.greenparty.ca/en/blogs/1099/2009-02-02/pdf-power-point-slides-community-organizing-workshop

Pay special attention to the added comments on the first step, THE SOCIAL SURVEY.  We should be doing this in every riding RIGHT NOW.

After the 2008 election there was some added discussion on ways forward for the Green Party that would lead to electoral success.
What Needs to be Done:
http://www.greenparty.ca/en/node/8529

And more recently Mark Kersten blogged about strategies for the next election campaign:

http://www.greenparty.ca/en/blogs/2619/2009-05-19/questions-green-party-s-election-campaign-green-dialogue

Please read these links, familiarize yourself, and see how they can be applied in your riding.  Finally, what is the story you’re going to be telling, BEFORE, DURING, and AFTER the next election?

Sincerely,

Matthew Piggott
Kitchener Centre EDA Communications Chair

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The Need to Organize and the Need to Elect

Submitted by Steve May on 2 June 2009 - 11:07am.

If you click on some of the above links, you'll no doubt encounter some comments which I have posted.  It's with regards to those comments that I wanted to quickly indicate that I'm glad to see that the point of this thread, which focusses on the need for community organizing, is directed at achieving the result of electing Green Members of Parliament.  While no timelines are here suggested (and that's fine), I believe that we're going to have to start showing electoral success to Canadians in this next election, else we risk the possibility of irrelevancy.  In which case, long-term community organizing won't have much of a pay off.

That being said, that's not a reason NOT to organize.  In fact, we all absolutely have to start, or continue with our organizing activities.  Local success depends on it.  We here in Sudbury have essentially had to start from scratch, but over the past year we've made some headway.  This paid off in the last election with 7.7% of the popular vote, up from 2.6% in the 2006 election.  But clearly, we've got a long way to go.  And we know we won't likely be making that big breakthrough in the next election, so we're relying on others to elect Green MP's.  What we want everyone to know is that through our organizing, we'll be there in second wave to challenge the established parties.  If there is to be a second wave.

So, organize for future success.  But don't let's not lose sight of the need to elect Green MP's now.

"Sudbury" Steve May

"Sudbury" Steve May

Steve, you still don't get it.

Submitted by Bill Hulet on 3 June 2009 - 10:58am.

Steve:

You still don't get the point of community organizing.  You seem to think that we can get people elected without having strong ties in the community.  Well, that's simply impossible.  You got 7.7% of the vote---big whoopie!  That is never, ever going to get Greens elected in a first-past-the-post system.  NEVER!  It is enough to get Greens elected in a proportional system like in the non-Anglo/Saxon democracies.  But it isn't enough in Canada.

I'm making a fuss about this because you are making yourself the spokesperson for "Jiminey Cricketism" on this discussion list.  The only success that we get in some ridings is through long-term community organizing.  Every time people like you bang the drum of "we need to elect people", you are in effect, telling people to not waste their time and money on community organizing.  This means that people never make the conceptual leap necessary to learn how to actually do politics instead of indulge in Jiminey Cricketism.

You know, this is exactly the same sort of denial that fuels people like climate change deniers. You don't want to accept the fact that there is no free lunch, which would imply that you are going to have to spend years doing community organizing before you can hope for electoral success.  So you shove your head in the sand and keep following the strategy that has failed us already for over 20 years.

Ultimately, this is why the environmental crisis still has no real traction in politics.  People who are small "g" greens are too "groovy" to actually do any grassroots political organizing, and too arrogant to listen to anyone who actually has done the work and learned how it is done.  

 

"There is always an easy solution to every human problem--neat, plausible, and wrong." H.L. Mencken

"There is always an easy solution to every human problem--neat, plausible, and wrong." H.L. Mencken