What is the Detroit People's Movement Assembly Process

I recently went to an excellent discussion about the state of Detroit's education at the Boggs Center. Over and over again it was emphasized that education often (maybe even mostly) happens outside of the classroom. As one of the anchoring organizations of the 2010 United States Social Forum I learned this lessons. Especially during the People's Movement Assembly (PMA) Process. In April we will have a city wide PMA in Detroit to create an alternative vision for land use were we will put into practice this style of community learning.

So what is the PMA?

We are a collective of community members that come together around shared principles. We look to the principles of environmental justice, the earth charter and the human rights for guidance. We hold each other and ourselves accountable to those principles with love. We are making our best effort to solve the most significant problems of the day. And in doing so we will spend more time building than attacking. The Detroit People’s Movement Assembly is a grassroots approach and we believe that self-determination should be at the center of the PMA and at the city’s foundation.

Our concerns with the Detroit Works Plan: Corporations cannot dictate the role of Detroiters and certainly not without involving them in the planning and real democratic decision-making related to their city. In this PMA process we presume that people have power, and that we are not victims. Together we are learning that the strongest solutions happen throughout the process, not in a moment at the end of the process. Together we are learning that the most effective strategies for us are the ones that work in situations of scarce resources and intersecting systems of oppression because those solutions tend to be the most holistic and sustainable.

We have a vision. We want to build on existing strengths and Detroit’s rich history. We know that when we look at the data that the mayor’s office is putting out and we read in the Huffington Post that the “only people left in the D are those that have no other options” that is not our living reality. Because when we look at their plan and when we look at our community capital of freedom schools, black owned business, community schools, youth organizing, community kitchens in churches, music and historical neighborhoods build by the people and made unique by its residence and we see two completely different analyses of a city. We made each neighborhood that is the tapestry of the city - we know we are the city.

We understand pain. We know there is a place for mourning and anger of the people that are being displaced, had their utilities cut off, even lost their children because their water bill was too high. We need a place to grieve and express our frustration. We honor this pain, and we don’t want to live there.

We are not the first to go through struggle and we are not alone now as we struggle. People throughout history have had to fight, struggle and articulate a better vision for what they need for their community and their sustainability. All of us are working in our particular and unique way but we do want to reflect that the PMA is not new but has been building up for a few years before the first USSF held in Atlanta in 2007. We do not just meet. We are creating plans. We want to be the ones telling the story and making the media.

We have been building as social movements from bottom up styles from community visions and desire. The PMA is our responses to this – a space to build our own narrative, our own plan, our own media. Even now through the people’s movement assembly process, we are connected to a national movement and to an international movement. The PMA process is something that Detroiters learned during the second US Social Forum held in Detroit. Over 25,000 people came to the city in June of 2010 to learn from Detroit’s leadership and the models of resistance we have created and are creating in the city. We built as a community during the USSF and have trained with our national PMA partners on how to build movement and facilitate a city wide visioning process.

We are connecting to others in the city who also have a vision – like Detroiters for Dignity and Democracy, the People’s Water Board, People and Energy, the Food Justice Task Force and the Detroit Digital Justice Coalition (to name a few). We are lifting up the solutions that currently exist in the city, and we are a group that is finding solutions to the most critical issues facing our city. This is hard, hard work. We work hard but we need to take care of the tools, resources, love, passion and hurt that we all bring. We are learning to do this but it is not without its bumps and bruises.

We are sick of being asked if we “are a believer”, were we “imported from Detroit”, do we “Declare Detroit”?

We have a voice. We have a vision. We are connected.