Read about how our CLIs are
helping Community Labor United
achieve success in Boston, MAThe Civic Leadership Institute (CLI) is a civic education program for existing community leaders, elected officials and public policy-makers. Participants learn about the regional economy, the role of public policy in shaping community well-being, and the common interests that bind leaders together in a shared vision of equitable regional economic growth. A principal outcome of the CLI is to generate a new cadre of leaders with a shared vision and policy agenda.

The CLI is usually presented as a series of 3-5 hour sessions held over a period of 6 to 10 weeks in different cities across the country. Sessions are highly interactive, respecting the experience and perspectives of the carefully selected participants who are in the room. Supporting this interactive design are learning materials to support facilitators and guest speakers drawn from local knowledge circuits.

CLI Overview

Unlike national organizations which frequently approach communities as political missionaries, Building Partnerships believes that "cookie cutter" approaches don't work and that the only successful coalitions are the ones its members build for themselves.

Creating successful coalitions begins with Building Partnerships' Civic Leadership Institutes (CLI): an eight-week series of seminars and workshops conducted locally which bring together neighborhood activists, labor leaders and others to carefully examine their regional economies and options for progressive reform.

The Civic Leadership Institute prepares participants to lead a regional movement to build power in your area. The base curriculum divides into two parts:

1) a big picture look at your region and how to reshape it and
2) a nuts-and-bolts examination of how to influence specific levers of public authority and to strengthen local grassroots institutions key to a democratic society.

Once invited to a community, the institute's program is determined by local activists and policy specialists drawn from area universities together with Building Partnerships leaders. However, each institute includes a "core curriculum" of five modules developed by Building Partnerships in conjunction with faculty members at Wayne State University in Detroit, San Jose State University and Pennsylvania State University. These modules explore a range of crucial public policy concerns and strategies for change, including:

Part One: Reshaping Our Region

• Module One: Why Regions Matter.  The regional level is a key site for both business decisions and our organizing that connects to our constituents' many specific concerns.
• Module Two: Voices of the Past/Paths for the Future.  Local history prepares us to build a regional movement by showing how decisions are made, who makes them, and how our grassroots groups have had or not had influence and why.
• Module Three: Rebuilding America's Social Contract Region by Region.  This session explores how participants can develop locally the kinds of strategies that progressive leaders elsewhere have used to build regional power.

Part Two: Rebuilding Democratic Institutions

• Module Four: Activist Government in a New Economy.  This segment looks at how specific public bodies shape our well-being and how we can reshape those decisions.
• Module Five: Getting Started.  By doing a power analysis participants lay out the components of their class project.
• Module Six: Strengthening Key Democratic Grassroots Institutions. In the final module, participants discuss why the fight for the right of workers to organize is key for the region's well being and how diverse groups can support this struggle.

These seminars and others not only help institute participants expand their knowledge of complex economic and political issues; they also offer a unique opportunity for each to gain insights into the perspectives of their potential allies. This understanding is fundamental to building coalitions that can organize for change--and win.