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| Learn how to organize a group of individuals and professionals around a common cause, working together to achieve a unified goal. |
Often, community problems or issues are too large and complex for any one agency or organization to tackle. In these cirumstances, putting together a coalition of groups and individuals can be an effective strategy for changing the programs and policies - in schools, business, government, and other relevant sectors - that are needed to solve the problem or achieve the goal. This section discusses what a community coalition or partnership is, why and when it can be a good strategy, who should be included, and how to implement it.
In simplest terms, a coalition is a group of individuals and/or organizations with a common interest who agree to work together toward a common goal. That goal could be as narrow as obtaining funding for a specific intervention, or as broad as trying to improve permanently the overall quality of life for most people in the community. By the same token, the individuals and organizations involved might be drawn from a narrow area of interest, or might include representatives of nearly every segment of the community, depending upon the breadth of the issue.
Coalitions may be loose associations in which members work for a short time to achieve a specific goal, and then disband. They may also become organizations in themselves, with governing bodies, particular community responsibilities, funding, and permanence. They may draw from a community, a region, a state, or even the nation as a whole (the National Coalition to Ban Handguns, for instance). Regardless of their size and structure, they exist to create and/or support efforts to reach a particular set of goals.
Coalition goals are as varied as coalitions themselves, but often contain elements of one or more of the following:
In November of 1986, at an international conference on health promotion co-sponsored by the Canadian Public Health Association, Health and Welfare Canada, and the World Health Organization, participants drafted what has become known as the Ottawa Charter. This document set out guidelines for attaining healthy communities and a healthy society, and laid the groundwork for the Healthy Communities movement. Perhaps its most important statement is encapsulated in these two sentences:
"The fundamental conditions and resources for health are: peace, shelter, education, food, income, a stable ecosystem, sustainable resources, social justice, and equity. Improvement in health requires a secure foundation in these basic prerequisites."
There are a number of reasons why developing a coalition might be a good idea. In general terms, it can concentrate the community's focus on a particular problem, create alliances among those who might not normally work together, and keep the community's approach to issues consistent.
Consistency can be particularly important in addressing a community issue, especially if there are already a number of organizations or individuals working on it. If their approaches all differ significantly, and they're not cooperating or collaborating, it can lead to a chaotic situation where very little is accomplished. If, on the other hand, they can work together and agree on a common way to deal with the issue and on common goals, they're much more likely to make headway.
Some more specific reasons for forming a coalition might include:
When discussing duplication of effort, "unnecessary" is a key word. In most instances, a number of organizations providing similar services, or services to the same population, are addressing a need greater than even all of them together can meet. The important thing here is to explore whether a unified approach can in some way increase or improve the services currently available.
There are often barriers to starting a coalition, and it's important to be aware of and anticipate them, because they may dictate the process the coalition will have to follow in order to begin successfully. Among the most likely:
Part of a solution here may often be providing support for those who aren't used to the "professional" way of holding meetings and reaching conclusions, while at the same time training professionals and others to include those whose opinions are likely to be far more accurate and important to the solving of the problem than their own. This might mean bringing in an outside facilitator, or simply paying careful attention to guiding the process from within the group.
If you understand the potential barriers to forming a coalition in your community, you can plan for them, and increase your chances of success.
A coalition needs to have a purpose if it is to be successful. As discussed above, the purpose may be broad or narrow, but it's unlikely that a diverse group will come together unless there's a reason to do so. At particular times, circumstances help to move the formation of coalitions.
When dramatic or disturbing events occur in a community. In a town of 6,000 in western Massachusetts, four women were murdered by their domestic partners in a space of less than a year. These murders spurred the formation of a coalition to address not only domestic violence, but the whole issue of violence against women, and such related problems in the community as drug dealing and the lack of responsiveness of the courts.
The events leading to the formation of a coalition don't necessarily have to be local. In the wake of the destruction of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, many communities formed local coalitions to contend with such issues as intolerance toward Muslims and the psychological effects of the disaster on children and families.
When new information becomes available. The latest unemployment figures may show that the community's jobless rate is rising rapidly, motivating the formation of a coalition to deal with economic development. A new study may alert a community to the fact that Black males - a significant part of its population - are at very high risk for heart disease, and community health providers may respond to that risk with the formation of a coalition to provide information, testing, and treatment to that population.
When circumstances or the rules change. After the state passed welfare reform legislation, an already economically depressed rural county found itself faced with the prospect of finding permanent jobs for a large number of welfare recipients within the next two years. As a result, the local welfare office, the local branch of the state employment agency, and several other agencies that worked with welfare recipients and their families formed a coalition to try to deal with the situation.
When new funding becomes available. A new Request For Proposals (RFP) from a state agency or other source of funding may either require a coalition to obtain funding for a particular service, or a coalition may form in order to create a comprehensive proposal that would spread the funding as widely as possible throughout the community.
An anti-poverty agency in Hampshire County, Massachusetts, took the lead in establishing a coalition of educators, health professionals, child care and human service providers, and parents to act as the required community oversight committee for a Department of Education grant that offered services to the families of children aged three and under. The group planned the grant proposal, and then continued to act as the advisory group for the administration of the funds after the proposal was successful. The members of the coalition also used it to refine and improve their cooperation and collaboration with one another in all their work, resulting, over the long term, in better services across the board in the county.
When there's an outside threat to the community. Communities have formed coalitions, for instance, to prevent their local hospitals from being purchased by national, for-profit health providers; to keep out unwanted, pollution-causing industry; and to preserve open space from development.
When a group wishes to create broad, significant community change. Sometimes a problem or issue is so complex and deeply-rooted that only major changes in the way the community views things, or even in its social fabric, can have any effect. In that situation - again, the Pryorville youth violence problem is an example - a broad coalition is necessary to draw in all affected elements of the community, and to approach the problem on a number of different levels.
A coalition for social change can be a different proposition from one dedicated to much narrower or shorter-term goals. For one thing, social change takes time - years, or even decades, not months. Coalition members have to make a commitment for the long run, and they -or their organizations, as individuals come and go - have to honor that commitment.
A second point is that a social change coalition has to be held together by a coherent, shared vision. Such a vision is usually not possible without a group process that can articulate the vision and help others see it as a reachable goal.
Third, social change coalitions often have to settle for small gains that add up only over time. Members must be able to be satisfied with small victories and to weather the inevitable setbacks that sometimes cancel those victories out. Taking the long view is as important to successful social change as making a long-term commitment.
When you have not only a good reason for starting a coalition, but also the possibility that one can be started successfully in the community. This is an extremely important issue, one that is dependent upon a number of factors:
Even if there is enough trust to start a coalition, be aware that it is not only possible, but just about inevitable that there will be bad feeling among some groups or individuals. That's a reality in any community, and the coalition will probably have to face it. In many cases, working together toward a common purpose can do a lot to change attitudes and to smooth over the past. but in other cases, it won't make any difference at all, and old enmities will surface.
A coalition will only be formed when it can be.
In general, the broader the membership of any coalition, the better, but there are certain people and groups whose representation on a coalition is absolutely essential.
These are the people who have a stake in the success of the coalition's efforts. They can include:
It's extremely useful to save seats at the table for those who can influence large numbers of others. Clergy, business or civic leaders, or people who are simply highly credible in the community may fall into this group.
Involving emerging leaders is equally important. These are people, often without a particular position, whom others look to for guidance. They may be leaders of volunteer efforts, youth highly respected by their peers, active parents, or just those with clear leadership potential. They are important to have on board, both for their ideas and energy, and for the influence they wield and will wield as they become more widely known and respected in the community.
The participation of local political leaders, state representatives, and others in policy-making positions will both add credibility to your enterprise and increase the chances that you can actually influence policy in your area of interest.
In addition to these specific groups, virtually any coalition can benefit from the membership of at least some concerned citizens who may have no direct connection to the issue at hand. Such people can both act as barometers of the attitudes of the community at large, and can bring information back to the community that helps to explain the work of the coalition and give it a higher profile.
Another group that you might want to involve, but in a slightly different way, is the media. Rather than trying to get media members to join, you might want to contact them to publicize and cover your coalition and its efforts. If they join, there may be ethical limitations on the amount of coverage they can give you.
So. you've decided a coalition is indeed the way to go in your community. How do you actually go about starting one?
You're probably already not alone in your concerns about the issue at hand, and you may already have a core group - a few individuals or organizations - ready to work at forming a coalition. If not, your first step is to find and make contact with those few individuals and organizations most involved with the issue.
Some reasons why a core group, rather than an individual, should lead the effort:
There are a few ways to approach assembling a core group:
Try to recruit to the core group some members of the group most affected by and concerned with the problem. A youth violence coalition should look for teens - perhaps gang members - to be core group members; a homeless and housing coalition should try to recruit current or former homeless people. Incorporating such people into the core group will give you a built-in reality check, provide a link to the group they represent, add credibility to your effort, and make clear your commitment to a participatory process.
Especially if your coalition has a narrow and time-limited purpose, there are probably people or organizations you can't do without. It's important to identify them, and to target them specifically for membership. This may mean courting them - an initial meeting over lunch where you pick up the tab, for instance, or a promise of a place on the steering committee.
Most of these individuals and organizations are referred to in "Who should be part of a coalition?" above, but each community is different. In yours, there may be a specific person among the target population, or a particular town official, without whom nothing can get done. The chances are you - and if not you, then other members of the core group - know this person, or at least know who she is, and have some connection to her.
As mentioned earlier, none of this is to say that you shouldn't recruit many other people and organizations to your coalition as well. It simply means that you need to make a special effort to enlist these crucial members.
Now that your core group is in place, and you've decided on the potential members who are necessary to the success of the coalition, you can start recruiting members. Although it's important to start with the individuals and groups mentioned above, you'll probably want to be as inclusive as possible. It's unusual to hear about a coalition suffering because it has too many members.
Use the networking capacity of your core group to the fullest. The core group can brainstorm a list of possible members, in addition to those deemed essential. Then each member can identify individuals on the list whom he knows personally, or organizations where he has a personal contact. If there are names left on the list without a contact, they can be divided among the members of the core group.
There are, obviously, a number of ways to contact people and organizations, including:
These are listed here in their approximate order of effectiveness, with direct personal contact being the best. It also takes longest, however, and probably should be reserved for those "must-haves" we discussed earlier. Most people are likely to be recruited by phone.
Be sure to ask those you talk to for suggestions about other potential members, and try to have them make the contact. That will spread out the work, and also give the invitation more credibility, since it comes from someone the contacted person knows. If you are successful, you could end up contacting and recruiting several times the number of people and organizations on your original list.
When you contact people to recruit them to the coalition, make sure you have something substantive to offer or to ask them to do. An invitation to a first meeting - at a specific time and place far enough in the future that schedules can be arranged to fit it in - is perhaps the most common offer, but you could also, for instance, ask people to contact their state representative or to work with a small group. An appeal to join without something specific attached to it will often fall on deaf ears. People's time is valuable, and they want to know that it won't be wasted.
The first meeting of a coalition is important. If it's a high-energy, optimistic gathering that gets people excited, you're off to a good start. If it's depressed and negative, or just boring, it's a good bet that a lot of people won't come back. It's up to the core group - in what may be the last official task they undertake - to plan a meeting that will start the coalition off on the right foot.
There are really two concerns here: the logistics of the meeting (where, when, how long, etc.) and the content of it.
There are a number of possibilities for the content of the first meeting. The agenda should depend on your particular issue and purposes, and on the needs of your community, but you'll probably want to include some of the following:
You've held a successful first meeting - terrific! The job of building a coalition has only begun, however. First, you have to follow up to make sure that there will be a well-attended second meeting at which work can continue.
The list that follows is one for whoever is actually putting the coalition together. That may be an individual, a core group, a staffer, or even a new coalition governing body of some sort. Whoever it is, someone has to be responsible for keeping an eye on the larger picture and making sure that the jobs get done. Without some level of coordination from somewhere, it's very unlikely that a coalition will survive and succeed.
There are a number of specific things - some of which you 've already started in that first meeting - that need to be done to make sure that the coalition keeps moving forward.
The author has been a member of several coalitions. One was governed by a formal Board of Directors, with officers and an Executive Committee that included the officers and committee chairs. Another was essentially run by a paid director, with a good deal of input from coalition members, but only nominal oversight. A third was coordinated by a steering committee whose membership was open to any member of the coalition. All of these coalitions worked reasonably well, accomplishing their goals largely through committees or task forces. The first and third began without professional staff, and became successful enough that they were able to obtain funding for full -time directors.
What all these coalitions had in common were strong leadership and a clear sense of where they were going at any given time. (The goals and purposes of all of them changed from time to time, in response to external conditions and the needs of their members and communities.) The need for strong leadership - whether individual or collaborative - cannot be overstressed. The ideal, in many ways, is to have the leadership dispersed throughout the coalition so that the departure of an individual doesn't create a vacuum. But however it's distributed, leadership is the one thing a coalition can't do without.
In addition to the specifics above, there are some more general elements to starting a coalition:
By the same token, it's important that there be a mechanism for getting things done when there is a disagreement, whether it's a majority vote or something else. A long -term disagreement over strategy or tactics can hang up a coalition permanently, and make it totally ineffective.
In situations where issues are too large and complex for a single organization to address, a coalition of groups and individuals working together may be the solution. A coalition can develop a coordinated response to an issue, increase the efficiency of service delivery, pool community resources, create and launch community-wide initiatives, build and wield political clout to influence policy, and work effectively toward long-term social change.
Coalitions may form in response to:
Whatever the reason, coalitions can only form when the possibility - in the form of mutual trust and a perceived need - exists. They should encompass all stakeholders - those affected by the work of the coalition and by the issue it addresses - as well as community opinion leaders, policy makers, and community members at large.
To start a coalition, it's best to begin with a core group and work outward, pulling in the necessary members mentioned above, as well as a more general membership from the community and from other, more peripherally-involved organizations. Holding an exciting first meeting at which there are real accomplishments and/or the work of the coalition is set in motion will help to launch the enterprise successfully.
Even more important is following up before the second meeting to make sure that groups are doing the work they said they would do, that attendance won't fall off, and that new members will be added. Areas that must be addressed are
Finally, you have to continue to pay attention to some general rules for forming and running a coalition:
A coalition can be a powerful force for positive change in a community. If you can form one that lasts and addresses the issues it was meant to, you've done a major piece of community building work.
