Michelle Meagher Change Maker Chat

Michelle Meagher Change Maker Chat

The power of our largest corporations is all around, but what happens if a corporate foot soldier decides – “enough.” Then uses her inside knowledge to teach people like you and me how to level the playing field? Michelle Meagher is a corporate lawyer and now whistleblower on the system ready to share lessons and insights about how to dramatically change market power. Join our weekly email list to hear our latest musings, podcasts and training. Click on this button…

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Adam Barbanel-Fried Change Maker Chat

Adam Barbanel-Fried Change Maker Chat

Can we use old social change strategies like one to one relationships to make electoral politics different? Adam Barbanel-Fried and his organisation Changing the Conversation Together did exactly this in the 2020 US Election. As a long time community organiser he used Deep Canvassing – door to door conversations that could help voters interpret the election through the eyes of those who they love. The strategy proved to be a powerful antidote to Trump’s Presidency. Adam shares his journey that…

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#30 Kabul Peace House

#30 Kabul Peace House

During the 2000s, in the mountains of central Afghanistan, a remarkable but unlikely peace movement began. How did they even define peace in a place beset by war,  and how did they organise themselves to work towards this audacious goal? Listen to the episode on iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify or most podcast apps. ChangeMakers Podcast · #30 Kabul Peace House Short video clip about Afghanistan and book: Hardie Grant: https://www.hardiegrant.com/au/publishing/bookfinder/book/the-kabul-peace-house-by-mark-isaacs/9781743793152 Reviews: https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/books/non-fiction-reviews-the-kabul-peace-house-and-three-other-books-20190627-p521xl.html Donations: https://www.erc.org.au/afghan_project Join our weekly email list to hear…

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How the US Election is all about Community Organising

How the US Election is all about Community Organising

While the drama of the President’s coronavirus diagnosis, “Red Mirages and Blue Shifts” and stolen postboxes are catching the headlines in the US Elections, it is community organising that is likely to make or break the result for the Democrats (and let’s face it – for democracy). Even before COVID-19, two new (old) approaches to social change were adapted to electoral politics. One is called Deep Canvassing and the other Relational Organising. COVID-19 created barriers to door-to-door outreach that saw…

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Steve Killelea Change Maker Chat

Steve Killelea Change Maker Chat

ChangeMakers Podcast · Steve Killelea – ChangeMaker Chat Steve Killelea is one of Australia’s most successful businessmen and a self-described peace maker! In this Chat we talk about why he combined these two passions. We explore how his peace work developed from an idea hatched while working in Africa, to creating the largest index for peace in the world! Join our weekly email list to hear our latest musings, podcasts and training. Click on this button to subscribe:

We need a Real Deal from the Australian Budget

We need a Real Deal from the Australian Budget

It’s budget day. While traditionally a nerd’s holiday – this budget matters. Globally nations are slipping into depression. In Australia unemployment is as high as it’s been since the Great Depression. This year’s budget is a reckoning. In my work outside of ChangeMakers, I’ve been part of an extraordinary coalition of organisations asking this exact question. In May 2019 in the weeks after the last Federal Election a group of organisations led by the University of Sydney’s Policy Lab (where…

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We’ve all been in this together. Now let’s get out of it together.

We’ve all been in this together. Now let’s get out of it together.

As the pandemic descended on Australia we were told that we were ‘all in this together.’ For a time, politicians lived up to that. Political leaders reached across partisan divides on policy. In March, there was even unity between Gladys Berijiklian and Daniel Andrews. The new National Cabinet process emphasised consensus over division. Old ideological habits dropped away too, with the parties cohering around a plan to protect lives and livelihoods and then to build back better after the pandemic….

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Mike Gecan – Change Maker Chat

Mike Gecan – Change Maker Chat

Mike Gecan is a 45 year veteran organiser based in the United States. He is the former National Co-Director of the first, largest and oldest community organising network in the world – the Industrial Areas Foundation. He talks to us about what organising is, and what it is not. He shares stories about how he learnt about power, and explores some of the differences between social change traditions like mobilising and organising. He also gives us a fresh take on…

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Samuel Chu Change Maker Chat

Samuel Chu Change Maker Chat

ChangeMakers Podcast · Samuel Chu – Change Maker Chat Samuel Chu is a long time community organiser and the founder of the Hong Kong Democracy Council in the United States. In this Chat we explore how he has connected his identities as an organiser and a Hong Konger to create a radically different form of international solidarity in the US. His approach translated the energy of protest into politics, securing bipartisan support for multiple pieces of legislation in support of…

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Coalitions: We need to get better at working together

Coalitions: We need to get better at working together

Back in 2003, I was part of the movement that tried to stop the war in Iraq. In Sydney we built an enormous coalition of over 70 organisations. We met every week on Monday evenings on the third floor of an aging inner-city pub called the Spanish Club.  The coalition had lots of rules. Every organisation was allowed to bring two representatives to meetings, and both could vote. That rule was practical, in a variety of ways. The room struggled…

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