IME the people you recruit will reflect the method of recruitment. Protests, encampments, unions, music, doorknocking, posting… will primarily bring in the type of people who are interested in that kind of activity.
If a lot of people become engaged in one thing, some of them won’t like it and they might meet others who’d prefer to do something else and organically split off into something else. Sometimes people who meet organizing as tenants form an art collective, but tenant organizing isn’t a “pipeline” to art collectives.
It is possible to intentionally bring people in through one kind of activity and provide the conditions such that many of them will see the wisdom in moving on to another kind of activity that would be more useful. It’s even possible to use the fact that you know the intake activity is doomed to fail as a way to hurry people along.
But it will only happen in any substantial way with A Plan. Not organically. Not by sort of vaguely having information around.
You need to have a plan of inoculation that explains what’s happening and why, and help the new people to see how power could be better built and wielded. From the beginning, you are talking about other possibilities and maybe even start setting those things up. So that when the original actions end as predicted, you don’t look like a big Loser. “OK, that didn’t work. On to the next thing!” and everyone already knows what the next thing is. Otherwise, some people will fall off thinking “This is stupid there’s no point” and some will get stuck in the cycle of tinkering trying to get it perfect next time.
IME the people you recruit will reflect the method of recruitment. Protests, encampments, unions, music, doorknocking, posting… will primarily bring in the type of people who are interested in that kind of activity.
If a lot of people become engaged in one thing, some of them won’t like it and they might meet others who’d prefer to do something else and organically split off into something else. Sometimes people who meet organizing as tenants form an art collective, but tenant organizing isn’t a “pipeline” to art collectives.
It is possible to intentionally bring people in through one kind of activity and provide the conditions such that many of them will see the wisdom in moving on to another kind of activity that would be more useful. It’s even possible to use the fact that you know the intake activity is doomed to fail as a way to hurry people along.
But it will only happen in any substantial way with A Plan. Not organically. Not by sort of vaguely having information around.
You need to have a plan of inoculation that explains what’s happening and why, and help the new people to see how power could be better built and wielded. From the beginning, you are talking about other possibilities and maybe even start setting those things up. So that when the original actions end as predicted, you don’t look like a big Loser. “OK, that didn’t work. On to the next thing!” and everyone already knows what the next thing is. Otherwise, some people will fall off thinking “This is stupid there’s no point” and some will get stuck in the cycle of tinkering trying to get it perfect next time.