Spring 2023
Summary
As we close out the 2023 academic year, the Practicing Democracy Project has plenty to celebrate and much to continue to learn. We reinvented our foundational degree course in people, power, and change as an intensive “courseshop,” followed by a campaign coaching practicum, with the creative and pedagogical leadership of Sarah ElRaheb-Dagher, Predrag Stojicic, Toni Kokenis, and Jake Waxman, among many others. We trained 150 new leaders and organizers in our global online Executive Education course in , guided by Ashraf Hamzah, James Brockman, and a stellar teaching team. We piloted the Liberation Lab, a co-curricular leadership program for Harvard students on , led by Abel Cano and Kortni Malone. We began a new chapter in our practice-based research, examining questions of organizational structure, effectiveness, and self-governance with Yong Jung Cho, Liz McKenna, and many compatriots in both academia and practice. We hosted five reading and discussion sessions on political economy for organizers and trainers with Professors Margaret Levi, Liz McKenna, Danielle Allen, Rebecca Henderson, and Naomi Oreskes. We supported the learning of public narrative and organizing with colleagues at Harvard and around the world, including at the , the , the , the , the , the Leadership for System Change program for Schwab Foundation fellows, the, and the . We continue to contribute to and learn from our friends and colleagues in the Leading Change Network, Ahel, Haiyya, Community Organizing Japan, WiLD, re:power, and others all over the world. And, of course, we celebrated 80 trips around the sun with Marshall Ganz!
Publications
Events and Talks
Related News
- Harvard Commencement addresses by Public Narrative alums:
Fall 2022
Publications
Events
Spring 2022 News
Pedagogy Convening
On March 19-20, 2022, the Practicing Democracy Project and the collaborated to host the first online convening of 68 educators, practitioners and researchers of Community Organizing and Public Narrative from 13 countries to share, explore, and integrate methods of teaching, coaching, and practice—catalyzed recently due to the urgent need to adapt to online learning in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The convening also created an opportunity for the cultivation of deeper and diverse relationships.
View the full report from the convening, where we have compiled key learnings from five presentations on innovation in the Public Narrative practice, leadership development, and team-based organizing practice, including:
- A micro workshop to teach the use of empathetic bridge and narrative in moments of disruptive challenge: Loss, Difference, Power, and Change
- Exploring how Public Narrative training can be scaled using digital micro learning platforms
- Adapting the Organizing pedagogy to build practice-centered programs for leadership development with the Formerly Incarcerated People (FIP) Fellowship
- Using data analysis to learn how to facilitate a team-based organizing project in the vlog graduate course MLD-377
- ’s pedagogy for stronger teams and collective leadership in Jordan, Amman