Often, community problems or issues are too large and complex for any one agency or organization to tackle. In these cirumstances, putting together a coalition of groups and individuals can be an effective strategy for changing the programs and policies - in schools, business, government, and other relevant sectors - that are needed to solve the problem or achieve the goal. This section discusses what a community coalition or partnership is, why and when it can be a good strategy, who should be included, and how to implement it. Show
What is a coalition?In simplest terms, a coalition is a group of individuals and/or organizations with a common interest who agree to work together toward a common goal. That goal could be as narrow as obtaining funding for a specific intervention, or as broad as trying to improve permanently the overall quality of life for most people in the community. By the same token, the individuals and organizations involved might be drawn from a narrow area of interest, or might include representatives of nearly every segment of the community, depending upon the breadth of the issue. Coalitions may be loose associations in which members work for a short time to achieve a specific goal, and then disband. They may also become organizations in themselves, with governing bodies, particular community responsibilities, funding, and permanence. They may draw from a community, a region, a state, or even the nation as a whole (the National Coalition to Ban Handguns, for instance). Regardless of their size and structure, they exist to create and/or support efforts to reach a particular set of goals. Coalition goals are as varied as coalitions themselves, but often contain elements of one or more of the following:
Why start a coalition (and why might it be difficult)?There are a number of reasons why developing a coalition might be a good idea. In general terms, it can concentrate the community's focus on a particular problem, create alliances among those who might not normally work together, and keep the community's approach to issues consistent.
Consistency can be particularly important in addressing a community issue, especially if there are already a number of organizations or individuals working on it. If their approaches all differ significantly, and they're not cooperating or collaborating, it can lead to a chaotic situation where very little is accomplished. If, on the other hand, they can work together and agree on a common way to deal with the issue and on common goals, they're much more likely to make headway. Some more specific reasons for forming a coalition might include:
Barriers to starting a coalitionThere are often barriers to starting a coalition, and it's important to be aware of and anticipate them, because they may dictate the process the coalition will have to follow in order to begin successfully. Among the most likely:
If you understand the potential barriers to forming a coalition in your community, you can plan for them, and increase your chances of success. When should you develop a coalition?A coalition needs to have a purpose if it is to be successful. As discussed above, the purpose may be broad or narrow, but it's unlikely that a diverse group will come together unless there's a reason to do so. At particular times, circumstances help to move the formation of coalitions. When dramatic or disturbing events occur in a community. In a town of 6,000 in western Massachusetts, four women were murdered by their domestic partners in a space of less than a year. These murders spurred the formation of a coalition to address not only domestic violence, but the whole issue of violence against women, and such related problems in the community as drug dealing and the lack of responsiveness of the courts.
The events leading to the formation of a coalition don't necessarily have to be local. In the wake of the destruction of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, many communities formed local coalitions to contend with such issues as intolerance toward Muslims and the psychological effects of the disaster on children and families. When new information becomes available. The latest unemployment figures may show that the community's jobless rate is rising rapidly, motivating the formation of a coalition to deal with economic development. A new study may alert a community to the fact that African-American males - a significant part of its population - are at very high risk for heart disease, and community health providers may respond to that risk with the formation of a coalition to provide information, testing, and treatment to that population. When circumstances or the rules change. After the state passed welfare reform legislation, an already economically depressed rural county found itself faced with the prospect of finding permanent jobs for a large number of welfare recipients within the next two years. As a result, the local welfare office, the local branch of the state employment agency, and several other agencies that worked with welfare recipients and their families formed a coalition to try to deal with the situation. When new funding becomes available. A new Request For Proposals (RFP) from a state agency or other source of funding may either require a coalition to obtain funding for a particular service, or a coalition may form in order to create a comprehensive proposal that would spread the funding as widely as possible throughout the community.
When there's an outside threat to the community. Communities have formed coalitions, for instance, to prevent their local hospitals from being purchased by national, for-profit health providers; to keep out unwanted, pollution-causing industry; and to preserve open space from development. When a group wishes to create broad, significant community change. Sometimes a problem or issue is so complex and deeply-rooted that only major changes in the way the community views things, or even in its social fabric, can have any effect. In that situation - again, the Pryorville youth violence problem is an example - a broad coalition is necessary to draw in all affected elements of the community, and to approach the problem on a number of different levels.
When you have not only a good reason for starting a coalition, but also the possibility that one can be started successfully in the community. This is an extremely important issue, one that is dependent upon a number of factors:
A coalition will only be formed when it can be. Who should be part of a coalition?In general, the broader the membership of any coalition, the better, but there are certain people and groups whose representation on a coalition is absolutely essential. Stakeholders.These are the people who have a stake in the success of the coalition's efforts. They can include:
Community opinion leaders.It's extremely useful to save seats at the table for those who can influence large numbers of others. Clergy, business or civic leaders, or people who are simply highly credible in the community may fall into this group.
The participation of local political leaders, state representatives, and others in policy-making positions will both add credibility to your enterprise and increase the chances that you can actually influence policy in your area of interest.
How do you start a community coalition?So...you've decided a coalition is indeed the way to go in your community. How do you actually go about starting one? Put together a core group.You're probably already not alone in your concerns about the issue at hand, and you may already have a core group - a few individuals or organizations - ready to work at forming a coalition. If not, your first step is to find and make contact with those few individuals and organizations most involved with the issue. Some reasons why a core group, rather than an individual, should lead the effort:
There are a few ways to approach assembling a core group:
Identify the most important potential coalition members.Especially if your coalition has a narrow and time-limited purpose, there are probably people or organizations you can't do without. It's important to identify them, and to target them specifically for membership. This may mean courting them - an initial meeting over lunch where you pick up the tab, for instance, or a promise of a place on the steering committee. Most of these individuals and organizations are referred to in "Who should be part of a coalition?" above, but each community is different. In yours, there may be a specific person among the target population, or a particular town official, without whom nothing can get done. The chances are you - and if not you, then other members of the core group - know this person, or at least know who she is, and have some connection to her. As mentioned earlier, none of this is to say that you shouldn't recruit many other people and organizations to your coalition as well. It simply means that you need to make a special effort to enlist these crucial members. Recruit members to the coalition.Now that your core group is in place, and you've decided on the potential members who are necessary to the success of the coalition, you can start recruiting members. Although it's important to start with the individuals and groups mentioned above, you'll probably want to be as inclusive as possible. It's unusual to hear about a coalition suffering because it has too many members. Use the networking capacity of your core group to the fullest. The core group can brainstorm a list of possible members, in addition to those deemed essential. Then each member can identify individuals on the list whom he knows personally, or organizations where he has a personal contact. If there are names left on the list without a contact, they can be divided among the members of the core group. There are, obviously, a number of ways to contact people and organizations, including:
These are listed here in their approximate order of effectiveness, with direct personal contact being the best. It also takes longest, however, and probably should be reserved for those "must-haves" we discussed earlier. Most people are likely to be recruited by phone. Be sure to ask those you talk to for suggestions about other potential members, and try to have them make the contact. That will spread out the work, and also give the invitation more credibility, since it comes from someone the contacted person knows. If you are successful, you could end up contacting and recruiting several times the number of people and organizations on your original list.
Plan and hold a first meeting.The first meeting of a coalition is important. If it's a high-energy, optimistic gathering that gets people excited, you're off to a good start. If it's depressed and negative, or just boring, it's a good bet that a lot of people won't come back. It's up to the core group - in what may be the last official task they undertake - to plan a meeting that will start the coalition off on the right foot. There are really two concerns here: the logistics of the meeting (where, when, how long, etc.) and the content of it. There are a number of possibilities for the content of the first meeting. The agenda should depend on your particular issue and purposes, and on the needs of your community, but you'll probably want to include some of the following:
Follow up on the first meeting.You've held a successful first meeting - terrific! The job of building a coalition has only begun, however. First, you have to follow up to make sure that there will be a well-attended second meeting at which work can continue.
Next steps.There are a number of specific things - some of which you 've already started in that first meeting - that need to be done to make sure that the coalition keeps moving forward.
General guidelines for getting a coalition off the ground.In addition to the specifics above, there are some more general elements to starting a coalition:
By the same token, it's important that there be a mechanism for getting things done when there is a disagreement, whether it's a majority vote or something else. A long -term disagreement over strategy or tactics can hang up a coalition permanently, and make it totally ineffective.
In SummaryIn situations where issues are too large and complex for a single organization to address, a coalition of groups and individuals working together may be the solution. A coalition can develop a coordinated response to an issue, increase the efficiency of service delivery, pool community resources, create and launch community-wide initiatives, build and wield political clout to influence policy, and work effectively toward long-term social change. Coalitions may form in response to:
Whatever the reason, coalitions can only form when the possibility - in the form of mutual trust and a perceived need - exists. They should encompass all stakeholders - those affected by the work of the coalition and by the issue it addresses - as well as community opinion leaders, policy makers, and community members at large. To start a coalition, it's best to begin with a core group and work outward, pulling in the necessary members mentioned above, as well as a more general membership from the community and from other, more peripherally-involved organizations. Holding an exciting first meeting at which there are real accomplishments and/or the work of the coalition is set in motion will help to launch the enterprise successfully. Even more important is following up before the second meeting to make sure that groups are doing the work they said they would do, that attendance won't fall off, and that new members will be added. Areas that must be addressed are
Finally, you have to continue to pay attention to some general rules for forming and running a coalition:
A coalition can be a powerful force for positive change in a community. If you can form one that lasts and addresses the issues it was meant to, you've done a major piece of community building work. |