6Experiment with alternatives for social change

Our starting point

Collective solidarity actions try to include the most vulnerable and often excluded people in the process of social transformation.

What we have learned

Impact studies of projects conducted by members of the Train to Transform collective were carried out in 2022. The cross-functional analysis of these studies highlighted lessons learned by the organizations regarding the concrete application of the six priorities for social transformation. Here is what we learned for priority 6 :

• Solidarity-based collective action has a political dimension. Even though it does not always aim to change public policy as such, it helps to improve community life.

• It is interesting to work on the geographical dimension in mobilising people, by thinking about how groups with appropriate scope and aims.

• These alternatives can either be historical initiatives readapted to the current context, or be inspired by existing alternatives in other territories and adapted locally. Other sources of inspiration are to be explored.

• Meetings between collectives are a great source of inspiration when it comes to suggesting alternatives.

• Participants may encounter pitfalls, obstacles and reluctance of individuals or local stakeholders to get involved in action, but strategies are being developed to overcome this challenge.

What remains to be verified

• Collective solidarity actions can be a local source of economic, social, political and/or environmental innovation. They are qualified as innovative according to their capacity to respond to the specificities of the territory concerned.

• The analysis of the impact of collective solidarity actions give those who commit to them the ability to show their contribution to social change.

An example of activities/actions : MPP in Haiti!

"MPP supports 2 types of collectives. Farmers’ groups that commit to conducting a collective economic production/processing farming, breeding, or handicrafts activity. The other type of collective: agroforestry brigades ("brigades agro sylvicoles—BAS") that set up reforestation activities and that combat soil erosion on the plots of members. Both the farmers’ groups and the agroforestry brigades use agroecological techniques.

The agroforestry brigades encourage mutual aid and peer learning: it is the collective that serves individuals, whereas within the farmers’ groups it is the individual who serves the collective via an approach based on solidarity.

The farmers’ groups and agroforestry brigades participate in mobilisation and protest actions organised by the MPP to promote food sovereignty and the role that farmers play in Haiti. "