Our work seeks to support change agents in creating equitable systems. When we began our work, we engaged our community to ask what had supported them when they succeeded in changing systems. What their stories revealed is that changing systems does not happen alone. Collaboration and effectively working in solidarity are key components of success.
And yet, the mindsets of individualism are so deeply embedded in our cultural context in the US that even when we are working with others we often fail to truly collaborate. Disrupting the mindsets and behaviors of individualism is a critical step towards creating systemic change.
This tool works to make visible the mindsets and behaviors of individualism – which have been so normalized as to often be imperceptible. As well as naming the mindsets and behaviors of solidarity, which require us to build new muscles and work in new ways. Providing alternative behaviors and mindsets help us know what to invest in as we seek to collaborate to create systems change.
Solidarity is a powerful reality to reach for – and not one that is easily achieved. Moving in the direction of mutuality and reciprocity that solidarity invites us towards yields great rewards. It acknowledges the reality that we are interconnected and cultivates the possibility for more powerful transformation in our efforts – as relationships are built, trust is deepened and silos are disrupted. Even when our efforts do not fully achieve their intended goals, solidarity asks us to dig into complexity and therefore moves us towards more fully developed solutions. Solidarity is both an aspiration and a chosen approach that we can seek to live out every day.
As you’ll see the images we’ve chosen to illustrate the mindsets and behaviors of individualism and solidarity draw on the natural world. They remind us that the soil – or context – in which our work is growing matters as it nourishes the roots of our efforts. What we choose to plant also matters. Are we working in siloed ways that create a monoculture of just one kind of flower – one way of operating or one worldview – or are we working in solidarity planting a variety of flowers that can cross-pollinate and support one another?
How to use this tool?
This tool is broken into three sections:
Section 1: Understanding Mindsets
- Provides a framework for reflection by naming and making visible the mindsets and behaviors of individualism and solidarity.
Section 2: Collaboration
- Supports you to think about the collaborations you are engaged in as you seek to create equitable systems. These collaborations could be formal coalitions seeking to change policy or they could be a small group of coworkers seeking to imagine new ways of operating. The tool can you reflect on how you can move your collaborations from being rooted in individualism to being rooted in solidarity.
Section 3: Assessment & Action
- Engages you in reflecting on your context and assessing how individualism and solidarity are showing up in your work and provides some resources that can support you in embedding practices in your collaborations that can move you towards solidarity.