What is a community organizer?

By
Angela Glover Blackwell                                                  Read Spanish Version

This
week, we’ve heard a lot of mocking of community organizers. Former
New York Gov. George Pataki even took time to ask, “What
in God’s name is a community organizer?”

Well,
governor, I’ll tell you.

Community
organizers are the ones who fill in the cracks left behind by
government and the private sector. They are the ones who helped
regular people change their block, their neighborhood, their city,
even their country. They are the ones who are there to stop absent
landlords, rally for new parks or hold crooked politicians
accountable. They are the ones who are needed most by those most in
need.

Without
community organizers, we wouldn’t have had the civil rights
movement. Without community organizers, we wouldn’t have even the
most basic labor protections. Without community organizers, parents
wouldn’t have the power to make sure their kids’ school was up to
snuff.

There
are many kinds of experience we need in our political leaders. To
dismiss the hard, vital work of community organizers is an insult to
everyone who has ever carried a picket sign, spoken out for justice
or rallied for a better, more just world.

Angela
Glover Blackwell is ounder and CEO of PolicyLink,
a
national research and action institute advancing economic and social
equity.