The fourth edition of
Community Organizing and Community Building for Health and Social Equity provides both classic and recent contributions to the field, with a special accent on how these approaches can contribute to health and social equity. The 23 chapters offer conceptual frameworks, skill- building and case studies in areas like coalition building, organizing by and with women of color, community assessment, and the power of the arts, the Internet, social media, and policy and media advocacy in such work. The use of participatory evaluation and strategies and tips on fundraising for community organizing also are presented, as are the ethical challenges that can arise in this work, and helpful tools for anticipating and addressing them. Also included are study questions for use in the classroom.
Many of the book’s contributors are leaders in their academic fields, from public health and social work, to community psychology and urban and regional planning, and to social and political science. One author was the 44th president of the United States, himself a former community organizer in Chicago, who reflects on his earlier vocation and its importance. Other contributors are inspiring community leaders whose work on-the-ground and in partnership with us “outsiders” highlights both the power of collaboration, and the cultural humility and other skills required to do it well.
Throughout this book, and particularly in the case studies and examples shared, the role of context is critical, and never far from view. Included here most recently are the horrific and continuing toll of the COVID-19 pandemic, and a long overdue, yet still greatly circumscribed, “national reckoning with systemic racism,” in the aftermath of the brutal police killing of yet another unarmed Black person, and then another and another, seemingly without end. In many chapters, the authors highlight different facets of the Black Lives Matter movement that took on new life across the country and the world in response to these atrocities. In other chapters, the existential threat of climate change and grave threats to democracy also are underscored.
View the Table of Contents and introductory text for the supplementary instructor resources. (https://d3tto5i5w9ogdd.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/04143046/9781978832176_optimized_sampler.pdf)Supplementary instructor resources are available on request: https://www.rutgersuniversitypress.org/communityorganizing
List of Illustrations
Foreword by Antony B. Iton
PART ONE: Introduction
1 Introduction to Community Organizing and Community Building in a New Era
MEREDITH MINKLER AND PATRICIA WAKIMOTO
2 Why Organize? Problems and Promise in the Inner City
BARACK OBAMA
PART TWO: Contextual Frameworks and Approaches
3 Improving Health through Community Organizing and Community Building: Perspectives from Health Education and Social Work
MEREDITH MINKLER, NINA WALLERSTEIN, AND CHERYL A. HYDE
4 Anti-racism Praxis: A Community Organizing Approach for Achieving Health and Social Equity
DEREK M. GRIFFITH AND HEATHER CAME
5 Contrasting Organizing Approaches: The “Alinsky Tradition” and Freirian Organizing Approaches
MARTY MARTINSON, CELINA SU, AND MEREDITH MINKLER
6 It’s All Organizing, It’s All Love: Building People’s Power in Jackson, Mississippi
MAKANI N. THEMBA
PART THREE: Building Effective Partnerships and Anticipating and Addressing Ethical Challenges
7 Community, Community Organizing, and the Forming of Authentic Partnerships: Looking Back, Looking Ahead
RONALD LABONTÉ
8 Ethical Issues in Community Organizing and Capacity Building
MEREDITH MINKLER, CHERI A. PIES, PATRICIA WAKIMOTO, AND CHERYL A. HYDE
9 Communities Driving Change: A Case Study from King County’s Communities of Opportunity
ROXANA CHEN, KIRSTEN WYSEN, BLISHDA LACET, WHITNEY JOHNSON, AND STEPHANIE A. FARQUHAR
PART FOUR: Community Assessment and Issue Selection
10 Community Health Assessment or Healthy Community Assessment: Whose Community? Whose Health? Whose Assessment?
TREVOR HANCOCK AND MEREDITH MINKLER
11 Mapping Community Capacity
JOHN L. MCKNIGHT, JOHN P. KRETZMANN, AND LIONEL J. BEAULIEU
12 Selecting the Issue
LEE STAPLES AND RINKU SEN
PART FIVE: Community Organizing and Community Building within and across Diverse Groups and Cultures
13 Education, Participation, and Capacity Building in Community Organizing with Women of Color
LORRAINE M. GUTIÉRREZ AND EDITH A. LEWIS
14 Mobilizing Black Barbershops and Beauty Salons to Eliminate Health Disparities: Lessons Learned on the Road to Health Equity during a Global Pandemic
LAURA A. LINNAN, STEPHEN B. THOMAS, AND SUSAN R. PASSMORE
15 Popular Education, Participatory Research, and Community Organizing with Immigrant Restaurant Workers in San Francisco’s Chinatown: A Case Study
CHARLOTTE CHANG, ALICIA L. SALVATORE, PAM TAU LEE, SHAW SAN LIU, AND MEREDITH MINKLER
PART SIX: Using the Arts and the Internet as Tools for Community Organizing and Community Building
16 Creating an Online Strategy to Enhance Effective Community Building and Organizing: Harnessing the Power of the Internet
NICKIE BAZELL AND EVAN VANDOMMELEN-GONZALEZ
17 Using the Arts in Community Organizing and Community Building: An Overview and Case Studies
CARICIA CATALANI, ANNE BLUETHENTHAL, DIERDRE VISSER, MARÍA ELENA TORRE, AND MEREDITH MINKLER
PART SEVEN: Building, Maintaining, and Evaluating Effective Coalitions and Community Organizing Efforts
18 Community Coalition Action Theory: Designing and Evaluating Community Collaboratives
FRANCES D. BUTTERFOSS AND MICHELLE C. KEGLER
19 Addressing Food Insecurity and Tobacco Control through a Neighborhood Coalition: Applying Community Coalition Action Theory and Principles for Collaborating for Equity and Justice
PATRICIA WAKIMOTO, SUSANA HENNESSEY LAVERY, MEREDITH MINKLER, AND JESSICA ESTRADA
20 Funding for Community Organizing: Tips for Raising Money While Promoting New Thinking in the Funding Environment
R. DAVID REBANAL
21 Participatory Approaches to Evaluating Community Building and Organizing for Community and Social Change
CHRIS M. COOMBE, PATRICIA WAKIMOTO, AND ZACHARY ROWE
PART EIGHT: Influencing Policy through Community Organizing and Media Advocacy
22 Moving the Policy Dial through Equity-Focused Community Organizing
LISA CACARI STONE, MANUEL PASTOR, JOSEPH GRIFFIN, RACHEL MORELLO-FROSCH, AND MEREDITH MINKLER
23 Abolition as a Public Health Intervention: Building Multisector Momentum for Community Care and Criminal Legal System Policy Change
AMBER AKEMI PIATT, CHRISTINE MITCHELL, WAYLAND COLEMAN, AND MEREDITH MINKLER
24 Media Advocacy: A Potent Strategy for Engaging Communities in the Fight for Equitable Public Policy
LORI DORFMAN, PRISILA GONZALEZ, AND SHADDAI MARTINEZ CUESTAS
Appendixes
1 Challenging Ourselves: Critical Self-Reflection on Power and Privilege
CHERYL A. HYDE
2 Community Mapping and Digital Technology: Tools for Organizers
JASON CORBURN, MARISA RUIZ ASARI, AND JOSH KIRSCHENBAUM
3 Action-Oriented Community Diagnosis Procedure
EUGENIA ENG AND LYNN BLANCHARD
4 Sample Community Health Indicators for Use in Health Impact Assessment
HUMAN IMPACT PARTNERS
5 Skywatchers’ Values-Based Methodology and Guidance for Practice
ANNE BLUETHENTHAL, DIERDRE VISSER, NANCY EPSTEIN, AND CLARA PINSKY
6 Ladder of Community Participation in Public Health
JENNIFER LIFSHAY AND MARY ANNE MORGAN
7 Member Assessment of Coalition Process and Outcomes
TOM WOLFF
8 Issue-Development Worksheet
RINKU SEN
9 Choosing Tactics and Framing the Action: Key Questions
and Considerations for Getting It Right
MARK S. HOMAN
10 Engaging Coalition and Community Organization Members in a “River of Life” Exercise to Create a Historical Timeline
MAGDALENA AVILA, SHANNON SANCHEZ-YOUNGMAN, REVA HINES, LESLIE GROVER, AND NINA WALLERSTEIN
11 Using Force Field Analysis, SWOT Analysis, and Power Mapping as Strategic Tools in Organizing
MEREDITH MINKLER, ANGELA NI, CHRIS M. COOMBE, AND JENNIFER FALBE
12 Scale for Measuring Perceptions of Control at the Individual, Organizational, Neighborhood, and Beyond-the-Neighborhood Levels
BARBARA A. ISRAEL, AMY J. SCHULZ, EDITH A. PARKER, AND ADAM B. BECKER
Epilogue by Kathleen M. Roe
Acknowledgments
Notes on Contributors
Index
