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204 A VIEW AND LESSONS FROM THE FIELD

circumstances. However, it also necessitates the creation of output objec-tives that stress both ends, making the project a challenge to evaluate.

Furthermore, documentation plays an important role in the evaluation process and helps maximize institutional memory. The evaluation process provides young people with an opportunity to share their stories with the outside world as well as promotes the organizational work and accom-plishments. However, unless there are formal mechanisms in place to cap-ture and document these experiences, much information will be lost. One youth organizer noted, ‘‘A lot of the best work happens off the radar screen. We are all so busy doing work. . . doing good work. . . we aren’t doing the organizational promotion or being really effective in gathering new re-sources’’ (W. K. Kellogg Foundation 2000, 15).

Wheeler (2003) observes that documents such as manuals, guides, and curricula not only aid in the evaluation process but also help organizations achieve long-term sustainability. A grasp of history can ease the transition for new staff as they learn about the organization’s philosophy and strate-gies; this process is particularly important in youth-led organizations be-cause of the constant turnover of participants and leaders, owing to some participants’ aging out and others’ growing into these roles.

A number of scholars and organizations have addressed this challenge in highly responsive ways. For example, the Innovation Center for Commu-nity and Youth Development (2003) identified seven outcomes for individu-als that should be a part of any youth-led community organizing effort:

1. Learning to navigate (moving in and out of various contexts with comfort and competence)

2. Learning to connect (communication and conflict resolution skills)

3. Learning to be productive (all aspects, from conceiving to complet-ing projects)

4. Increasing political knowledge and skills

5. Increasing efficacy and agency (confidence and sense of voice)

6. Increasing democratic values (embracing equity and fairness-related values)

7. Developing strong personal and civic identity (sense of personal transformation and membership in community)

Each of these outcomes easily has a corresponding core element in a youth development paradigm, although different terms may be used.

There are important lessons to be learned from unsuccessful organizing campaigns, as noted by one youth organizer (LISTEN, Inc. 2004, 10):

When you don’t win, people don’t say, you know that they don’t want to be a part of things that lose. But I think the most important things are the development, because that’s kind of the difference between advocacy and organizing. You can get a small group of lawyers or somebody to do something that might have the same impact, but in the long run that’s not

CHALLENGES INHERENT IN YOUTH-LED ORGANIZING

really building power or not shifting the balance of that power, and its reliant on people who aren’t experiencing the injustices.

Thus, emphasis on experience and lessons learned never should be lost in any campaign, regardless of the degree of success or failure! Furthermore, it would be irresponsible to imply that anything short of success constitutes absolute failure. Lessons with life-long application can be learned when young people draw positive outcomes from unsuccessful organizing efforts; this knowledge and perspective will aid them later in life, during times of great need. Indeed, this characteristic of youth-led organizing is one of many that must be present for young people to reap long-term benefits from their participation; a positive outlook also increases their likelihood of success in other efforts to bring about social change.

Not surprisingly, attributing community-centered change outcomes to youth-led organizing is much more difficult than evaluating efforts to bring knowledge and skills to participants (Innovation Center for Community and Youth Development 2003, 112):

We were not able, within the scope of this evaluation, to assess community outcomes in any systematic way. Beyond not having the resources to mea-sure community impacts, the field of community organizing and civic activism lacks clear established and tested benchmarks that we could use to assess community change. The complexity of political and social factors that influence shifts in community attitudes or policy makes community outcomes particularly difficult to measure.

However, this challenge must be met if the youth-led community orga-nizing field hopes to find wider acceptance among funding and academic sources. Thus, evaluating social-change efforts embraces the following seven points (Korbin 2000; South 2000):

1. Lack of adequate funding

2. Importance of viewing outcomes longitudinally over a period of time

3. Emphasis on behavioral outcomes at the expense of attitudinal changes

4. A complex power construct, necessitating a broad perspective to capture both explicit and implicit changes in power relationships

5. Emphasis on significant social changes at the expense of more frequent incremental changes

6. Determination about whether social changes and neighborhood characteristics have affected all social and demographic groups in the same manner, and if not, in what ways they have differed

7. Validity of the historical tenet in the field of community organizing that the process of achieving change is of equal to or greater im-portance than the ultimate outcome

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Any seasoned community-participatory evaluator will find the above points common considerations in carrying out an evaluation (Israel et al. 2005; Minkler and Wallerstein 2003). Community-focused interventions, by their very nature, are subject to a multitude of unanticipated forces and therefore have outcomes that are difficult to predict. Sometimes, these fac-tors facilitate implementation; at other times, they hinder it. Neverthe-less, the benefits of participation far outweigh the challenges and limitations of this form of social research.

On a final note, dissemination of the findings of any evaluation must go far beyond the conventional report and scholarly articles and books if the results are to reach young community activists and the adults instrumental in supporting them. The W. K. Kellogg Foundation (2000, 16) recommends a combination of methods for optimal dissemination:

Print materials (program brochures, flyers, information sheets, how-to manuals

Word of mouth

Local radio, local television, public access cable Newspapers (local, city, and regional)

Conferences (local, regional, and national)

Speaking engagements, both to reach out to various audiences and in response to invitations

Periodic and annual reports to funders and stakeholders Outreach to schools and community partners

Youth-created/produced media (newspapers, ‘‘zines, ’’ radio/TV productions created by young people, video letters)

Web sites and links E-mail and list serves

Video (documentaries on issues, program information, training materials)

Cultural and artistic performances (theater, spoken word, visual arts, photographic essays, video)

Public service announcements on regional media, MTV spots, movie theater placements

Gatherings for training and technical assistance Peer exchange programs

These are only a sampling of the ways to share evaluation results and pro-mote youth-led organizing initiatives.

Youth Organizing: Stand Alone

or in Unison with Others?

What is the best future for youth-led organizing? Is it preferable to go it alone, so to speak, because social-action agendas tend to make others feel

CHALLENGES INHERENT IN YOUTH-LED ORGANIZING

uncomfortable about joining in? Or, should youth-led organizing reach across the conventional divides of human services (including the youth field)? James (2005) addresses this very point in describing how best to at-tend to the fragmentation of youth fields, particularly as the number of young people doing this work continues to increase.

James’s call for a coordinated effort that serves young people speaks volumes about the growth of the field and its potential for benefiting all youth services. Although this exhortation is noble and its implications im-portant, it will not be met with open arms. Competition between youth organizations for funding and participants often is fierce, and this will be a major impediment to cooperation across sectors. Nevertheless, an effort should be made, even though prospects for success are slim. Marginalized youth historically have suffered from insufficient resources, yet invariably there is a synergistic effect when one or more programs are merged to launch an initiative. This cooperation always is needed and can serve as a model for adult services to come together, as well.

Locating Resources for Training

and Technical Assistance

We have stressed the importance of leadership development as a cross-cutting theme in the youth-led organizing model. However, lack of affilia-tion with large national or regional training networks and organizations is a common characteristic in the field. Intermediate support centers are few and far between. This situation poses a serious challenge for any approach that places a high priority on learning, consciousness raising, skills development, and personal growth. In essence, there is a significant shortfall of profes-sional training resources available to most local youth-led programs around the United States.

Certainly, materials and information do exist, as evidenced in the schol-arly work of Murphy and Cunningham (2003), Hardina (2002), and Homan (2004), not to mention the countless reports on youth organizing cited in this book; these all speak well for the field and its potential to increase in influence.

Intermediary organizations have been critical in moving the youth-led organizing field forward, as shown earlier in this chapter and in chapter 4. However, there is enormous need for expanded resources in this area. We believe that the major national foundations could accept this challenge and provide the requisite financial backing. Further, they could provide oppor-tunities for youth organizers to learn and share their skills and information internationally.

Ultimately, regional and national support centers will be needed to transcend the training and technical assistance functions. If youth-led or-ganizing holds true to its vision, it will continue to address major issues of

208 A VIEW AND LESSONS FROM THE FIELD

oppression and social justice. If so, at some point the organizing campaigns will need to be made national, even international, in focus and scope. Such an ambitious organizing agenda cannot be initiated, nor sustained, from a purely local base. Larger structures will be necessary to drive and coordinate national and international campaigns, even as the issues are ‘‘localized’’ for neighborhood or school district arenas. This challenge to broaden the focus must be met if the youth-led organizing movement hopes to step up to the next level of power.

Strategic and Tactical Considerations:

Outside or Inside Agents of Change?

Whether more can be accomplished from the inside or the outside is a classic question for any individual or group attempting to bring about social change. The inside strategy has the advantages of access to institutional de-cision makers, the potential for influencing opinions, the ability to obtain privileged information, opportunities to identify and cultivate allies in the power structure, a platform for legitimate criticism, and enhanced credibility with established powerful actors. But legitimacy can be a double-edged sword; it will cut back into the community if members perceive individuals having ‘‘sold out. ’’

Furthermore, change from within can place a young person in a tenuous position regarding the organization. By joining the decision-making struc-ture, to a large degree insider change agents forfeit their ability to criticize the process, since they have legitimized it through their participation. Once they are part of the official decision-making process, the members may be marginalized, viewed as tokens, compromised, or regularly outvoted as part of a relatively powerless minority, thereby becoming poster children for the concept of cooptation.

In contrast, outside strategies enable change agents to maintain a pure position, with total freedom to criticize targeted decision makers. When the campaign includes lively direct-action tactics, there also is potential, al-though no guarantee (see point number 8, above), that it will attract in-creased media coverage, since viewers, listeners, and readers often find the dynamics of contest and confrontation most engaging. Most important, an outside strategy has the greatest potential for using tactics that directly involve large numbers of the affected constituency—which is the funda-mental source of power in community organizing—and it also increases ‘‘participatory competencies’’ (Kieffer 1984); the degree of organizational ownership (Staples 2004a); and the sense of collective self-efficacy (Pecu-konis and Wenocur 1994).

However, those who use the outside approach always run the risk of being isolated and disregarded; the legitimacy of their claims may be questioned;

CHALLENGES INHERENT IN YOUTH-LED ORGANIZING

and they may fail to develop sufficient leverage to force decision makers to respond favorably. Outside strategies are labor-intensive, requiring aggres-sive and periodic recruitment, action research, strategic planning, and usually a series of direct-action tactics that mobilize large numbers of con-stituents to pressure institutional decision makers. Countertactics of the op-position must be anticipated and countered in turn; allies need to be en-listed; a media plan should be developed; and organizational leadership must be prepared for multiple roles and responsibilities.

Young activists, many of whom are marginalized in society, already are on the outside almost by definition; certainly, using customary social-action strategies to convince or coerce decision makers currently is the most prev-alent approach in the field. Indeed, many of the examples in this book are instances when youth-led organizing has attempted to bring about change from the outside. Results have been mixed, but certainly they have been sufficient to justify this study. Indeed, a youth-led organizing social move-ment is beginning to emerge, and it has operated to bring about change es-sentially from the outside in.

However, youth-led organizing efforts at times may consider inside strat-egies. This approach can be problematic, especially if the group is vulner-able to countertactics by targeted adult decision makers with the intent of coopting the movement. The increased status and heady atmosphere of rubbing shoulders with adults in positions of power can be seductive. There can be the illusion of inclusion, and participation can seem like real power. The possibility that powerful adults will make benevolent decisions that provide much needed resources for youth-led organizations can be compelling.

Not all targeted adults will deal in bad faith, of course. Many will turn out to be legitimate allies who will engage youth leaders in authentic, genuine dialogue. Under such circumstances, an inside collaborative strategy may make sense and provide ‘‘organizational mileage’’ (Haggstrom 1971).

The strategic and tactical repertoire of youth-led organizations should include both inside, collaborative approaches and hard-hitting, outside ad-versarial methods. Choosing the appropriate strategy can be challenging, however. The key is to make decisions based on the following principle: Which approach is most likely to produce a positive result while simulta-neously developing organizational capacity, or mileage, in the process?

Funding: Calling Youth-Led Organizing

by Another Name?

The influence of funding on youth-led community organizing never should be overlooked or minimized. The funding process itself requires organiza-tions to compete with one another; and this is problematic when youth-led

210 A VIEW AND LESSONS FROM THE FIELD

organizations are forced to vie for monies with groups that sponsor pop-ular, nonpolitical activities and services in addition to organizing.

When analyzing the sources of funding for Chicago youth-led organiz-ing, Parham and Pinzino (2004) note that money can be funneled through ‘‘youth development’’ and ‘‘civic participation’’ projects. However, the ma-jority of funding is received under the category of community organizing programming. This is important because this option provides the oppor-tunity of including youth-led organizing under a familiar funding category. Indeed, ideally the funding for youth-led organizing should be its own category, because of the expectations for activities usually associated with this form of intervention.

Clash of Cultures

No, this section does not focus on conventional ways of looking at culture as it relates to ethnicity, race, socioeconomic class, or even youth culture. We refer to another meaning of culture, this one related to clashes between social-justice politics and the world of nonprofit organizations. At first glance it may seem strange to some readers that a culture of social-justice politics may not mesh with the culture of nonprofit work. However, upon further study, it should be clear that action for social justice is not necessarily synonymous with nonprofit work.

Sherwood and Dressner (2004, 57), in a rare reference to this potential tension, note:

This clash is particularly evident around information sharing. Where funders, researchers and other interested outsiders assume that there is good will and mutual benefit in sharing information about organizations, programs, interests, and goals, some youth organizing groups do not. At a minimum, it can be time-consuming for a small organization to respond to requests for information. There might be questions about how the in-formation will be used, including whether it will be accurately presented and whether it will ultimately support or undermine the cause of youth organizing. . . . Further, some youth organizing groups—not unlike pre-vious generations of community-based organizations—analyze these interactions in the terms of power, dignity, and relationship that they use to develop their social justice campaigns.

Thus, Sherwood and Dressner (2004) do point out that social justice-related interventions may seem out of the mainstream for most nonprofit endeavors. This dislocation of social justice work is exacerbated by actions that are youth-led, because most nonprofit endeavors do not view young people as assets or potential decision makers. The tension between these two worlds will exist into the foreseeable future.

CHALLENGES INHERENT IN YOUTH-LED ORGANIZING

It would be irresponsible for us not to acknowledge this tension. Indeed, we think that a key factor here is the inherent political and adversarial nature of social justice work. It is about confronting the abuses of power, struggling for the redistribution of that power, and overcoming the inherent resistance to profound social change. In the true sense of the word, social justice work is radical, or root, change. On the other hand, the world of nonprofits is dominated by a service mentality that does little to alter existing power relations and patterns of oppression, which young people are so acutely aware of. The service provided by these institutions can be considered honest and valuable work, like most of social work, but it falls short of being reformist. Their targets of change invariably are the clients receiving ser-vices, rather than the unjust social systems that oppress people.

However, we believe that both forms of helping—as well as other forms— are necessary and worthy of respect. Because these two views have different basic operating assumptions and core values, there will be an inevitable and ongoing tension. It is no mistake that we end this chapter with this discussion. It would be simplistic to say that the entire nonprofit world is about service. Certainly, social action organizations are nonprofits themselves, as are CDCs, some prevention programs, public interest groups, think tanks, research centers, and training institutes. Consequently, all non-profits can’t be painted with the same brush. Nevertheless, we think that most readers will equate nonprofits with the human service sector.

Human services provide concrete benefits to individuals and groups who are in immediate need of assistance, and this worthy and beneficial activity should not be deprecated, dismissed, or devalued. Clearly, such services are important and necessary to reduce real pain and suffering, as they ameliorate the symptoms of many social problems. But frequently they are not sufficient to address the root causes of conditions that flow from inequality and oppression. Because services often help large numbers of people, they usually enjoy broad-based support among elected officials, the business community, and the general public—as long as they don’t cost too much in tax dollars. Relations between service providers and institutional decision makers tend to be collaborative. Public- and private-sector leaders from the power structure frequently sit on the governing boards of service agencies, and may even provide some direct funding.

Service agencies typically are reluctant to upset these established leaders. However, organizing for social-action challenges the existing relations of power, and the same institutional leaders who support service program-ming may be targeted by organizations promoting social justice. At mini-mum, an ambitious agenda for social-action organizing almost can be guaranteed to make these power holders nervous. This situation has signif-icant implications for available funding. Social service organizations take and receive monies from organizations where social action groups never would be welcomed. Indeed, many organizing projects would refuse to accept such funding, even if it were offered, because of the strings attached.

212 A VIEW AND LESSONS FROM THE FIELD

So, it should come as no surprise that funding sources for youth-led orga-nizing are much more limited than those for youth services.

What can be done to close the gap between the culture of nonprofit services and the culture of community organizing? The initial, and we be-lieve critical, step is to acknowledge that gap and to develop mechanisms for dialogue to occur. Only after a history of interactions whereby trust is developed will there be an effort to find the overlap between social justice and nonprofit work. However, while the disparities between the two cer-tainly can be reduced, if not minimized, we do not believe that they can be eliminated. Thus, these two planets will continue in their separate orbits, and every once in awhile they may cross paths for a short time before con-tinuing on their respective journeys.

Conclusion

No doubt other challenges will emerge as the field of youth-led organizing continues to develop and grow. But the fifteen dilemmas discussed in this chapter are hurdles enough as this book goes to press, with progress made in some areas more than in others. While a number of these topics are ap-plicable to most, if not all, forms of community organizing, all have ele-ments uniquely associated with the youth-led organizing examined here. And most of the solutions to these problems also will be youth specific. Given the creativity, energy, and commitment of the youth activists engaged in organizing, there is good reason for optimism, regardless of current challenges or future ones that inevitably lie ahead.

Epilogue

Understanding the everyday struggles and creative interventions that youth deploy in response to material and discursive pro-cesses of power, including those exercised by the state, is key for theorizing the role of youth in generating social change.

—Rios, From Knucklehead to Revolutionary (2005)

Writing this book has been a fascinating and enlightening journey for us. Youth-led community organizing must be solidly grounded in the context of the youth-led movement. It is important to appreciate both the history of this movement and the fact that its boundaries are ever changing. The be-ginnings of the youth-led movement can be traced back several decades, and there is no book that adequately captures its full breadth and depth during the early part of the twenty-first century, both nationally and inter-nationally. New developments continue to outpace our ability to study and write about this dramatic growth (Cohen 2006). This dynamism has been both exciting and frustrating for us; we believe that the reader may share this sentiment.

Youth-led social change may be conceptualized as an expanding uni-verse with all of the excitement and debate associated with such a phe-nomenon. There may be disagreement about where and when this world-wide youth-led movement started, just as there are differences of opinion about the origins of the universe. There also are arguments about how far this movement stretches and when it will contract—again, no different from the universe analogy. And similar debates have transpired about the youth development movement.

214 EPILOGUE

We believe that the reader must be prepared to tolerate this ambiguity about the youth-led movement’s origins and destination. However, this does not mean that practitioners cannot enjoy the movement, both in the present and retrospectively. There is tremendous excitement for those of us involved with youth-led organizing. From the academic side, there is an understanding that this explosive growth is special, with prodigious im-plications for society and the education of future practitioners and aca-demics. Academics and researchers alike will face all of the trials and trib-ulations associated with a field of practice that embraces the principles of social and economic justice and that is community centered. There will un-doubtedly be debates in academic forums about youth-led community or-ganizing and whether it is a subfield of adult organizing or a field of its own. Indeed, the presence of this debate signals a bright future for this field.

From the practitioner perspective, there also is excitement because of how youth-led organizing is transforming the lives of many young people whom this society essentially has written off. Yet, there also is the tension of trying to put boundaries around a phenomenon that simply defies being put into a box! If youth-led community organizing does eventually translate to a social movement, then its reach will be transnational or international, opening fertile fields for practitioners to teach and learn.

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