Whether primary care, prescription drugs, harm reduction, decent work or achieving status-for-all, universal access to health is needed now, more than ever. Join legendary organizer Marshall Ganz and other health-for-all organizers for a conversation on democracy, health, and organizing for change on Thursday, October 24th from 5:00pm to 6:30pm at Women's College Hospital's Auditorium.
Registration is free, but space is limited.
Marshall's latest book People, Power, Change: Organizing for Democratic Renewal will also be available for purchase at the event.
*With support from the St. Michael's Hospital Academic Family Health Team's SEED social prescribing program, we will have snacks and drinks for participants.
Agenda:
5pm - 5:30pm: Refreshments/Book Sales
5:30pm - 5:40pm: Introduction + Land Acknowledgement (10 mins)
5:40pm - 6:25pm: Discussion/In Conversation (45 mins)
6:25pm - 6:50pm: Audience Q&A (25 mins)
6:50pm - 6:55pm: Closing (5 mins)
About the author and book:
Marshall Ganz has spent his life dedicated to the craft of organizing people to enact the change they want to see in the world. Just a few of his experiences include advocating for civil rights with Bob Moses and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, 16 years organizing with Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers, developing the grassroots strategy for President Obama’s 2008 election campaign, and training future leaders for over 20 years at Harvard’s Kennedy School. Now, as democracy teeters on a precarious edge in this upcoming election, and as political, economic, and technological forces have weakened nearly all capacity for collective action, Ganz has distilled a half-century’s worth of insights into an urgent call for strengthening democracy, People, Power, Change: Organizing for Democratic Renewal (published August 1, 2024). Written in the tradition of classics like Saul Alinsky’s 1972 Rules for Radicals, Ganz’s transformational book is at once a practical guide on how to reclaim democratic power and an inspiring manifesto for collective organizing as an essential driver of democracy.
Whether it’s a political campaign, community organization, trade union, social movement, advocacy group, or workplace, Ganz argues, lasting and meaningful change only happens if people come together for a shared purpose, deliberate together, and act together. Through real-world examples, political theory, and illustrative diagrams, Ganz breaks down the organizing craft into six chapters that describe its essential components: relationship building, storytelling, strategizing, acting, structuring, and developing leadership.
Today’s threats—the climate crisis, the housing crisis, racism, xenophobia, socioeconomic inequality, transphobia, gun violence, and more—demand that we go back to the basics of how to work together to achieve change and shape a better world. With People, Power, Change, Marshall Ganz compellingly demonstrates that the only way through is by building power together.
