"Power concedes nothing without demand." — Frederick Douglass

Definition:

A process through which disenfranchised groups work to change oppressive policies and structures and fulfill their needs.

Users:

Members of oppressed and disenfranchised social groups and their allies.

Description:

Empowerment is often understood as a redistribution of power from the powerful to the powerless. However, this understanding of empowerment can actually be disempowering. The appropriate role of the person or group with power is to share, not to convey or impose. If I give or even lend you my power, you are beholden to me for it. If, on the other hand, I help you build your own power base, the power is yours, not mine. I may do this as a mentor, a researcher, a facilitator, or an ally, since leadership and spokesperson roles need to remain with the group that is in the process of empowering itself. The group must make and own its decisions, so that group members can develop and experience their own power. The strategies for empowering disenfranchised and oppressed people can be grouped into three general approaches: education, organization, and networking.

Education

Empowering educators must learn to draw out their students' knowledge and responses. Teachers present the material to the students for their consideration, and re-consider their earlier considerations as the students express their own. To bring about the deep change required to resolve conflict, educators must be willing to challenge deeply held assumptions. This assessment can be a wrenching process. It is also important to educate adversaries and potential allies. While at first many who benefit from the status-quo will not be willing to give up their privilege in order to create a more equitable social system, some will be willing to do so if they fully understand their part in the system.

Organization

An organization gives people a way of expressing their group needs in a way that cannot be ignored. This is the message that '60s community organizer Saul Alinsky presented so powerfully in his books and organizations. While many groups come together around specific issues, Alinsky advocated a different approach: first, the building of an organization and then, focusing on specific issues. In addition, confrontational strategies (such as marches, strikes, or publicity campaigns) geared to overcome the existing imbalance among the parties are crucial. Without a well-organized campaign, small victories may be won, but the overall climate and structure will remain.

Networking

Members of disenfranchised groups can realize and extend power through networking with others, both inside and outside their own social groups. Informal meetings can help participants to exchange resources and build alliances.

Intervention

Mediation may not be appropriate until power imbalances been addressed. Third parties can provide assistance, and can work as allies. It is not appropriate for outsiders to take on leadership roles, since the result may actually be disempowering. From the outset, small-group meetings are led by people from the community itself.

Examples:

One of the clearest examples of empowerment is the United States Civil Rights movement in the 1960s. American blacks took the initiative to organize and educate themselves and succeeded in making lasting changes. However, empowerment can take smaller forms. Naomi Wolf describes the effectiveness of "power groups" of women who meet each month. The structure that Wolf identifies revolves around a gathering at which members share a meal, talk to each other informally and share resources, contacts and information. In Wolf's group, these contacts have resulted in a wide range of new ventures by the women involved, from new jobs to putting on a benefit.

Applications:

In a conflict negotiation and mediation usually work best when the two parties have roughly equal power. Thus, empowerment of the oppressed group becomes important for both sides of the conflict. For this reason, empowerment is an important tool in any conflict when one side has significantly less power than the other.

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