Affinity Groups
AFFINITY GROUPS
Information adapted from Starhawk and Climate camp 2008
What is an affinity group?
Organise in clusters! Form a group with your friends! Be loud! Look exciting! Have fun!
An affinity group is a group of people who have an affinity for each other, know each others strengths and weaknesses, support each other, and do (or intend to do ) political/campaign work together.
Most of us will have had some childhood/formative experience of being part of a group whether informally, as in a group of kids that are the same age and live in the same street, suburb or town, or formally, as in being involved in a sports team. However, affinity groups differ from these for numerous reasons, as explained below, (hierarchy, trust, responsibility to each other etc).
The concept of affinity groups has a long history. They developed as an organising structure during the Spanish Civil war and have been used with amazing success over the last thirty years of feminist, anti-nuclear, environmental and social justice movements around the world. They were first used as a structure for a large scale nonviolent blockade during the 30,000 strong occupation of the Ruhr nuclear power station in Germany in 1969, and then in the United States occupations / blockades of the Seabrook nuclear power station in '71 when 10,000 were arrested and again many times in the highly successful US anti-nuclear movement during the '70's and '80's.
Their use in sustaining activists through high levels of police repression has been borne out time and again. More recently, they have been used constructively in the mass protest actions in Seattle and Washington. (* and in Australia, at Jabiluka, Melbourne World Economic Forum protests 2001, and Climate camp last year).
We don't have to use the word 'affinity group'
- blockade teams, action groups, support teams, action collectives etc. have all been used to describe the same concept.
It would be best to find the most relevant name depending on when and where the structure is used. Also, each affinity group can choose their own name. For example, at the AIDEX protest, there was a 'Perseverance Affinity Group' named after the Fitzroy pub where it's members had their first meeting.
Other names range across a whole gamut of political sensibilities (or the lack thereof ); from the "Screaming Trees", the "Alcoholics against the Bomb", to the "Buckrabendinni Action Tribe"
With whom do I form an an affinity group?
The simple answer to this is the people that you know, and that feel the same way about the issue(s) in question.
They could be people you see in a tutorial, work with, go out with, or live with. The point to stress however, is that you have something in common other than the issue that is bringing you all together, and that you trust them and they trust you.
An important aspect to being part of an affinity group is to get to know where each other stand regarding the campaign or issue. This can involve having a meal together, and you all discussing it after you have eaten, or doing some form of activist related training together, like attending a nonviolence, conflict resolution or facilitation workshop, working out what you want to get out of the day, how you want to be creative in the day or working out how to deal with certain police tactics ie: police horses.
You should all have a shared idea of what you want individually & collectively from the action/campaign, how it will conceivably go, what support you will need from others, and what you can offer others. It helps if you have agreement on certain basic things: how active, how spiritual, how nonviolent, how touchy-feely, how willing to risk arrest, when you'll bail-out, your overall political perspective etc.
But then again, you may all just work together at a job, be part of a Climate Action Group, play music or hike together etc.
Organisation
Within an affinity group, there are a whole range of different roles that it's members can perform. A lot of these roles will be determined by the aim of the AG, but could include a Media Spokesperson, to either talk to / deal with news media , a Quick decision facilitator, 1st Aid, a Spokesperson to convey the affinity group's ideas and decisions to other AG's, a Legal Observer, and Arrest support.
As well as these roles within itself the AG can take on a specialised role in the way it interacts with other AGs, or operates within the breadth of the protest or campaign. There can be affinity groups specialising in copwatching, legal observation, catering, communication & liaison, medical, clowning, or blockading.
With this role focus, each AG can do it's job and support the work of other affinity groups. In this way, many affinity groups form an interdependent network that achieves so much more than a large group of individual activists.
Within the context of a demonstration, as important as the aspect of the AG that is out on the street, is the support crew. Your support crew should be able to meet any arrested members at the police station, call anyone that needs it, like a freaked out mum who just saw you on the news, make sure your medical needs are covered, that people have food and water on the day, or just give hugs as required!
The aim at the end of the day is to look after yourself and each other, have fun, and work towards a maximised degree of constructive social change.
THINGS TO THINK ABOUT FOR HAZELWOOD
We need to draw on other peoples ideas about affinity group organising but make it work for our needs at www.switchoffhazelwood.org
Many of the traditional roles mentioned above are already covered. For example we have already established specialised affinity groups of: police liaison, legal observers, medical & media. You can form your own new affinity group, or there are some affinity groups that are open, that you can join. More information will be available at camp.
Consider that you may also end up working with people you may have recently met, or haven't worked with in this capacity before. It's therefore important you have discussions and clear ideas about what you want to get out of the action, how you will make decisions and boundaries for the actions you are willing to take.
Some questions to consider in your group:
•Why are you attending this action? What do you hope to get out of the day? What is the statement you are trying to make?
•How will the group make decisions?
•What are the skills you have within your group? (Ie: strong physical skills, theatre, cooking, sport, welfare, creative)
•Are there people willing to be arrested? Willing to support others if they are arrested?
•What kind of actions are you willing to take?
•What are your fears and concerns, what do you need to feel safe and supported?
Some fun ideas for affinity groups: Polar bears/penguins, Circus, Surf lifesavers with floaties, capitalists for coal, climate emergency services,sporting teams, coal cleaning ladies, endangered species... the sky is the limit!