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The Movement Action Plan is a strategic framework describing the eight stages of successful social movements. It also is a chapter out of a fantastic book called DOING DEMOCRACY. Large sections of the book are available free of charge through the Google Onling Book Project. Leaders and members of various organizations should consider two aspects of the book.

1. Grand Strategy formation, along with the difference between effective and ineffective advocacy efforts. It is extremely important to establish a published Grand Strategy that people, participants, and members can work from. Think of it as a powerful and guided MISSION Statement, but that grows with your organization.

2. The Eight Stages of a Successful Social Movement. This provides you the various the stages that you should expect with an active Social Movement. Remember, don't get frustrated because you don't get immediate results. Many of us have been working on projects to help for years. But now is the time to amplify efforts both individually and collectively. Through mass individual guided efforts they are recognized collectively and seriously.

The entire chapter in Doing Democracy: The Map Model for Organizing Social Movements can be found at Google Books free of charge.

APPLICABLE GET OFF THE BENCH Talk shows on closely related subject matter

Episode 80 - Revisitation of Successful Social Movements

Conference Call - Saturday: Rallies, Demonstrations, And Protests (Michigan)

I am slowly reworking this document to apply specifically to family rights advocacy as a model only. Feel free to alter as you see fit, so that the document matches with your own organizations' goals and missions. The below should be printed and circulated to individual organizations where each should share their own plans with other groups so that similarities, successes, and failures can be reviewed more quickly and collaboratively.

Stage One: Business as Usual

Only a relatively few people care about the issue at this point, and they form small groups to support each other. These can be seen in the form of both support group and fledgling policy shaping organizations. The main objective of the groups is to constantly keep people thinking about the subject of your social movement. In this case it is Equal Parenting by introducing proposed legislation *House Bill 4564* and *House Joint Resolution NN* as well as the following other forms of individual and collective advocacy.

Letters to the Editor: Supporting Equal Parenting, Informing Local Residents of the Problem, Demonstrating the Legislation will resolve a chunk of the issue.

Engaging in Public Debates Online: Be sure to express your support for equal parenting, talking points on the issues, and spread the word about proposed legislation being a good solution on each and every online forum website that you come across. These sites have a high number of participants that will help determine level of negative and positive feedback to expect. Starting winning people over.

Tell Two People Everyday: It is time to get your individual perspective into discussions everyday with new people. Associate it with current news events and trigger events that might be happening in your neighborhood, community, or state. In this issue, you are speaking about Equal Parenting solving some of the issue of absent parent households, taxpayer concerns, and other associated topics. Stay away from individual case issues and demonstrate that this is an issue of public concern and not individual concern.

As you can see the MAIN objective of Stage One is to get people thinking about the problem AND the solution. Do your best to spread the word and often try small action projects like call outs to legislators, small demonstrations and rallies and busy intersections, and low-cost pamphleteering.

Stage Two: Failure of Established Channels
A major reason why most of the public does not inform itself and act on an injustice is that people think (or hope) that established structures are taking care of it. The reality of it is that the establishment has been largely focused on revenue generation for state bureaucratic agencies, child support enforcement agencies, child protective services/foster care agencies, so on and so on.

In this stage the small groups challenge the established channels and that is where each of you come in. They often do research, or get victims of injustice to file formal complaints. They may sue governmental agencies, or use any opportunities to appeal that exist in the regulations. Usually the activists lose, at this stage, but it is very important that they take these steps. Stage two is essential for change, since large-scale participation will not happen as long as people believe in the established channels. In fact, you’ll find that, by stage two, polls show fifteen to twenty percent of public opinion is leaning toward a change.

Letters to the Editors should certainly continue in this phase. Target specific issues that are popular or unpopular in the news. For example maybe there is a local shakedown of parents in your community. Speak out against it.

Rallies, Demonstrations, and small protests should continue in this phase and efforts should be increased.

Individuals will try lawsuits against various agencies, politicians, or perceived wrongdoers. Grievances should be regular routine for individuals in this phase. It doesn't mean that you will win, but it will draw attention from other agencies that are vying for similar resources.

Begin to associate with others and assist with others that are involved in similar issues. Work together on your complaints and utilize local support group meetup points to begin to form larger organizations.

Start Showing Up to Local Government Meetings! Be sure to ask questions and get on your local access/public access channel by requesting support or posing hard questions to local politicians on the air. This will help local residents see that people care about the issue, in this case, equal parenting. It is free television advertising. Don't miss out on monthly meetings. Need talking points? Check with me and I will give you some.

Stage Three: Ripening Conditions/Education and Organizing
Now the pace picks up considerably, because many people who earlier did not want to listen become interested. This is largely attributed to more public awareness and visibility. Rallies, Demonstrations, and Protests as well as mass letters to editors about the issue are being seen more and more. The number of groups or organizations appears to be increasing and they are actively performing similar tasks even if they have not merged together. This is partly due to the effectiveness of the Grand Strategy that creates an outcome based workflow amongst organizations. The movement creates many new groups who work on this issue, largely through education and spreading the Grand Strategy. The groups send speakers to religious groups and union halls; they do marches through their communities; they hold house meetings and news conferences. Much of the content of what they say is refuting power holders’ claims: "Children Need Both Parents" "many parents are being forced absent by court order despite their willingness to actively fulfill a parental role," etc. This stage can take a very long time or a short time, depending on many things, but constant outreach, through education and forming new groups is essential for the movement to take off. By now, polls show twenty to thirty percent agree that there is a problem or an injustice.

Stage Four: Takeoff
This stage is usually initiated by a trigger event, a dramatic happening that puts a spotlight on the problem, sparking wide public attention and concern. Sometimes the trigger event is created by the movement. In 1963 the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, headed by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., focused on Birmingham, Alabama, in a direct action campaign which filled the jails and highlighted the evils of segregation with vivid pictures of police dogs and fire hoses. The Birmingham campaign triggered a national and international response, which resulted in the passage of major civil rights legislation.

Sometimes the trigger event just happens, like the near meltdown at the Three Mile Island nuclear reactor in 1979. Three Mile Island (TMI) precipitated massive nonviolent protest and propelled many new people into activity. Previous movement growth had been substantial, but TMI triggered a crisis atmosphere that brought depth and breadth to the movement. MAP shows that the takeoff stage needs the preparation of stages two and three. Nuclear power provides an example we can explore.

Many years before TMI, the Fermi nuclear plant in the city of Detroit nearly melted down. A disaster similar or worse than TMI threatened then, yet there was no social crisis and spurt of
antinuclear organizing. Why? Because there was no previous social movement challenging the normal channels (stage two) and no education and organizing (stage three). An event becomes a trigger event when a movement has first done its homework.

Because of the high media profile in this stage, many people associate social change with stage four. Often one or more large coalitions form at this time. Celebrities join the movement, the
power holders are shocked by the new opposition and publicity and try to discredit the movement, and polls show forty to sixty percent of the public say they oppose the injustice or current policies. Activists often unrealistically expect a quick victory at this point and work
around the clock. Long rambling meetings occur in which new people come and try to make decisions without the necessary procedures in place. The issue is seen in isolation from other issues.

The objectives of stage four are to build and coordinate a new grassroots movement and to win over public opinion. Part of winning the public is connecting the demands of the movement with widely held values (like freedom, fairness, or democracy).

Stage Five: Perception of Failure
There’s an old phrase: "Two steps forward, one step back." Stage five is the step back, in the perception of many activists. Numbers are down at demonstrations, the media pay less attention, and the policy changes have not yet been won. The power holders’ official line is, "The
movement failed." The media focuses on splits in the movement and especially on activities which offend public sensibilities.

It is the excitement and lack of planning on stage four that create the sense of failure in stage five. By believing that success is at hand, activists can become disillusioned and despairing when they realize they aren’t there yet. Hoping the recapture the excitement and confidence of stage four, some groups create Rambo-style actions of anger and violence or become a permanent counterculture sect that is isolated and ineffective.

Fortunately, a great many activists do not become discouraged, or if they do, accept it as part of the process. They treat it like rafters on a river who most of all love excitement of the white water, but also accept the slow times in between.

Smart strategists lay out strategic, achievable and measurable objectives, and smart movements celebrate them as they achieve them along the way. The power holders may try to crush the movement through repression at this point, even if they have felt constrained before by a civil liberties tradition. Even repression, however, can sometimes be responded to in the spirit of celebration, as a symptom of achievement.

Stage Six: Winning Over the Majority
In this stage the movement transforms. Protest in crisis gives way to long-term struggle with power holders. The goal is to win majority opinion. Many new groups, which include people who previously were not active, are formed. The new groups do grassroots education and action. The issue shows up in electoral campaigns, and some candidates get elected on this platform. Broader coalitions become possible, and mainstream institutions expand their own programs to include the issue.

Until stage six, much of the movement’s energy was focused on opposition (to toxic waste, to war, to homelessness, etc.). In stage six, sixty to seventy-five percent of the public agrees on a need for change. There is no a vast audience ready to think about alternatives to existing policies, and the smart movement offers some. Mainstream institutions can be helpful at this point. One example comes from the anti-Vietnam War movement: universities responded to stage four with peace studies courses and departments, and during stage six many of the scholars involved began thinking about alternatives to the war system.

The power holders are not passive. They try to discredit and disrupt the movement, insist there is no positive alternative, promote bogus reforms, and sometimes create crisis events to scare the public. The power holders themselves also become more split in this period.

The dangers of this stage are: national organizations and staff may dominate the movement and reduce grassroots energy; reformers may compromise too much or try to deliver the movement into the hands of politicians; a belief may spread that the movement is failing because it has not yet succeeded.

Stage Seven: Achieving Alternatives
Stages seven and eight could be called managing success. They are tricky, however, because the game isn't over until it's over. In stage seven, the goals are to recognize the movement’s success (not as easy as it sounds!)., the empower activists and their organizations to act effectively, to achieve a major objective or demand, and to achieve that demand within the framework of a paradigm shift — a new model or wa of thinking about the issue.

Goals or demands need to be consistent with a different way of looking at things: a new framework or paradigm. If a civil rights movement simply demands some changes of personnel in government, industry, or schools, it will get more women, people of color or lesbians and gays occupying functions that continue business as usual, including policies which oppress women, people of color, and gays. Social movements are usually much more creative than that, and project new visions of how things can be. A successful social movement, therefore, can gain objectives that, although grudgingly yielded by the power holders, introduce a new way of operating and of being.

Stage seven is a long process, not an event. The struggle shifts in this stage from opposing present policies to creating dialogue about which alternatives to adopt. The movement will have differences within itself about alternatives, and different groups will market different alternatives to the public. The central power holders will try their last gambits, including study commissions and bogus alternatives, and then be forced to change their policies, have their policies defeated,
or lose office.

It’s not unusual for another trigger event to come along (the Chernobyl nuclear meltdown) or be created (the 1965 Selma freedom march in the civil rights movement), which gives increased energy to the cause and wins over still more allies.

Each movement needs to develop an endgame which makes sense in terms of its own goals and situation. The fight against nuclear power is an example of change in which there was never a showdown in the United States Congress. Instead, the movement created enough obstacles in the U.S. market to result in a de facto moratorium on new plants, partly by showing them to be unacceptably costly.

Stage Eight: Consolidation and Moving On
The movement leavers need to protect and extend the successes achieved. The movement also becomes midwife to other social movements. We saw growing out of the 1960s civil rights movement, the student movement, the anti-Vietnam war movement, the farm workers union, the women’s movement, the American Indian movement, and others. The long-term focus of stage eight is to achieve a paradigm shift, to change the cultural framework.

The paradigm shift the civil rights movement initiated is still a major part of the U.S. agenda thirty-five years later: diversity as a positive value. In the 1950s, difference was shunned and feared. The rule was to conform. Even rock and roll was attacked as "a communist plot," because it was different from prevailing pop music. Ethnic minorities were taught to be as white and middle class as possible to fit in — that was their only hope (and not a large one) for acceptance.

The momentum of the civil rights movement and the movements it midwived continues today as an often intense struggle to see difference differently and to create the structures and processes that make diversity a strength in building community.

While the movement is consolidating its gains and dealing with backlash from those who never were persuaded, the power holders are adapting to new policies and conditions and often claiming the movement’s success as their own. At the same time, they may fail to carry out agreements, fail to pass sufficient new legislation, or weaken the impact of new structures by appointing people who are resistant to the change. A major pitfall awaiting activists in stage eight, therefore, is neglecting to make sure of institutional follow-through.

In this stage, the movement not only can celebrate the specific changes it has gained, but also can notice and celebrate the larger ripple effect it has in other aspects of society and even in other societies. The U.S. movement against nuclear movement was inspired by the mass occupations of construction sites by German environmentalists. On this shrinking planet, we get to learn from and inspire each other internationally.