1. Law school will try to rob you of the ability to analyze and recognize systems of power. Lawyers are trained in nothing so well as ignoring the realities of power dynamics in society. "Thinking like a lawyer" mostly involves applying overly formal legal rules while ignoring the fact that they were designed by the powerful for the purpose of maintaining that power. 

• Law students are taught that solutions to legal problems are small tweaks to formal rules or the interpretation of those rules. The stakes of those small, ultimately inconsequential tweaks are then artificially elevated by another "legal skill," debate.
• You'll often hear lawyers say that they can argue "both sides." But the ultimate function of debate in these circumstances is to limit the scope of imagination on possible solutions. Debate opens up an artificial distance between solutions that lead to the same result.
• Instead of investigating whether proposed solutions would actually result in better, more just outcomes in reality, lawyers are taught to make "logical, rational" arguments that may well have no basis in reality. 
• All the while, they will tell you that they are teaching you to be a rational, objective person, teaching you how to “reason.” Be suspicious of this from day one because no humans are fully rational and no mode of thinking can be objective, especially one that declares itself so.
• By the way, lawyers are sneaky so it’s sometimes difficult to see all this happening in real time. Law schools and professors don’t tell you that there is only one right answer because that would be too obvious. Instead, they tell you that there is one right way of reaching the answer. It just so happens that when you apply it, you almost arrive at an answer that upholds the status quo.
  

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2. In almost every case, your instincts (about who you are, what you believe, what has real value) are better going into law school than coming out. Find a way to preserve them: through regular self reflection, through conversations with people who know you from before, by writing a long polemic to yourself, whatever method is available to you. 

3. The law, as an institution, is fundamentally inhumane, in substance, in practice, and in form. If you’re not careful, law school will make you think that this is the way it has to be. 
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4. The law serves as a tool for upholding social hierarchy. As a result, law schools try to socialize you to accept hierarchy. It’s in the way lawyers twenty years out ask people where they went to school. It’s in the way law firms care intensely where applicants “rank” in their class. It’s in the way flagship law reviews pick editors. 

​5. Law school exams only tests for how well you can do law school exams. They do not reflect your ability to practice. Never forget that the people telling you that these exams have value (ie professors) are simply people who were good at taking these exams. Many of them might not even have much experience as practicing lawyers.

In honor of yet another billionaire rocketing themselves into outer space using blood money, I've written a short summary of my recently published law review article, which argues that current international law forbids private companies from claiming ownership over space objects. In other words, I argue that billionaires cannot actually start putting dibs on lunar craters and Martian mountains for their low-g mansions. In essence, the argument is that private parties are also subject to the international agreements between states which declare that space is a global commons that belongs to humankind, not individual countries and not individual businesses. 

International space law is grounded in the Outer Space Treaty, an agreement signed by more than a hundred nations. Drafted in the 1950s, the Outer Space Treaty’s animating principle is that space should be preserved as the “province of all [hu]mankind.” Based on both the text of the treaty as well as subsequent international agreements, this means that space is essentially a global commons, collectively owned by all humankind and to which no one may restrict access. This would make space analogous to a public park in that a group of people can make use of the space but not claim it permanently or prevent others from using it. This is already how countries who have signed the treaty regard space. For instance, when America landed on the moon, it did not seek to claim the surface as a colony.

Recall however, that this legal framework was established in the 50s before the era of private space corporations. At the time, nation states (and only a few) were capable of accessing space. Today however, concentration of wealth has created a class of billionaires who want to manifest destiny the galaxy. This rise of commercial private space corporations stresses the existing international space law framework because private corporations are not signatories to international treaties and are not widely understood to be directly bound by the responsibilities and duties within them. This interpretation is dangerous because it would allow private corporations to be irresponsible and destructive in space, as they have been on earth, but it is also incorrect. 

Unlike the domestic law of a nation, international law is usually understood to only apply to those parties who explicitly agree to be bound by it, for instance by signing a treaty. One exception to this rule is customary international law, which are universal and apply to all members of the community of states, including new states who have never formally signed onto an agreement. In entering space, private corporations enter a vacuum of sovereignty, much like new states enter a vacuum of sovereignty when they first come into existence. Therefore, just as new states are obliged to follow certain international laws, the legal responsibility to maintain space as a global commons also attaches to private corporations who enter space. 

The upshot of all this, legally speaking, is that corporations would not be able to claim wide swaths of space or half the moon as their private property, as they are dying to do. Taking this legal stance is important because practice and usage shape the law. Though I argue that international space law, as it currently stands, forbids private corporations from claiming the moon for their own, this can change. If companies begin to pitch tents branded with their logo on Mars and start to make plans to divert the orbit of mineral rich asteroids, they will erode the existing international law framework, bend it in their favor. 

Happy to provide the full law review article to anyone who wants a copy, just find me on twitter. The professor whose class I originally wrote the paper for was “not convinced,” but you can read it for yourself and decide.

Here's a link to the article on law review site: http://djilp.org/filling-the-vacuum-adapting-international-space-law-to-meet-the-pressures-created-by-private-space-enterprises/

Tl;dr Table ​

A DIY Guide to Institutional Change for Racial Equity
​To achieve racial equity, every institution, without exception, needs to change. Eradicating systemic racism requires overhauling our society’s individual components. Though there has been a national moment of reckoning over the persistence of racism and anti-Blackness in particular, increased awareness of the problem does not automatically result in improved conditions. Real change is possible but requires us to first imagine and then intentionally work to create a society in which Black lives matter and the concerns of other marginalized folx are taken seriously. This requires more than individual commitment to anti-racism. We also need to change our institutions so that they can help us work toward anti-racism instead of acting as tools to reinforce and uphold existing hierarchies. This applies on the large scale, to our justice system and electoral system, but it also extends to the everyday institutions such as our places of work and our schools. These smaller institutions also need to change and crucially, anyone who is committed to racial equity can and should work to create that change. This guide is intended to assist those seeking to engage in racial equity work at the institutions they are already part of.
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Why work to change institutions?
Our lives are shaped by institutions. Some of us are supported by them, granted opportunities, afforded credibility. Others are crushed by them. Companies, political parties, universities, and unions are all institutions. Thus, most of our waking hours are spent enveloped by institutions. Institutions are inescapable because society expresses and transmits its values through them. Inequity within an institution is reflected in the positions it takes, the roles it fills, the fights it lends weight to. Institutions are amplifiers so shifting an institution, ensuring its commitment to anti-racism, has ripple effects beyond the institution itself.

We also already shape the institutions we are part of. We reinforce the status quo when we acquiesce to it. We change institutional norms when we speak out. Institutions seem monolithic but they are made up of individuals. Being part of an institution means being connected to other people within it and those human connections can bring change. Indeed, building community is one of the most important things we can do to create a more just world. Great change is possible when people come together in solidarity and existing institutions provide a ready framework through which we can find and construct community with each other. Not everyone can influence the education system as a whole but anyone who is part of a school or a university can work to change it. Not everyone can shift the needle on underrepresentation within their industry, but anyone can work to ensure that their company does a better job recruiting and retaining women of color.

Can institutions change?
If the world is different from the world a hundred years ago, a millennia ago, it is because our institutions changed. But institutions are difficult to shift. Institutions, like societies, only change when enough people decide they must. Even with the repeated calls for racial justice and the frequent reminders of its necessity, there may not be enough collective will to make changes at a particular institution.

Thus, approach the project of institutional reform knowing that failure is possible. But even failure to attain a specific agenda can make a difference. Fighting for change models behavior for those who come after, making it more likely they will pick up the fight. Demanding that an institution do better is also a way to convince people who are not yet committed to the same goals. The myth of the "marketplace of ideas" obscures that there is nothing so convincing as watching others wholeheartedly fight for justice. Finally, you learn by doing and you build community in adversity, both of which make you stronger.

Disclaimers
This is not and cannot be a comprehensive guide. Each institution is different and so the path to anti-racism and ensuring it values Black lives in particular must be individually tailored. Instead, what follows is an attempt to define principles for discovering and implementing that individually tailored solution. The guide assumes the reader does not need to be convinced that racial equity is necessary, but rather needs a framework for how to think about changing an institution from the inside. It assumes there is some resistance to taking sufficient steps to ensure racial equity and that the reader will need to organize to create pressure for action.
My experience is shaped by time in educational institutions, government, and non-profits, organizations that profess a higher calling, an altruistic purpose. It is therefore sometimes easier to harness the stories that the institution tells about itself to change it. Finally, the advice that follows is arranged in chronological steps to make them easier to understand but that does not mean anyone needs to follow them in rigid order.

A DIY Guide to Institutional Change for Racial Equity​

A Note About the Form and Function of Institutions
The power of an institution lies in its ability to coordinate individual behaviors for a collective purpose. Institutions accomplish this by creating a culture that propagates, entrenches, and transmits norms by making them seem like “common sense.” To take a simple case, picture a high school class. When a bell rings, the teacher stops talking and the students gather their books to scatter to the next class. For someone who has never sat in a classroom like this, the flurry of activities accompanying the bell would be mystifying.

The key to understanding how institutions transmit norms is to realize that the socialized response to the ringing of the bell with this particular set of activities is the result of normative choices. The average high school student attends six or seven classes each day. Surely, for some students, spending all day on one topic is more effective. So why not teach one topic a day? Even this assumes a system in which knowledge is divided into separate topics rather than woven together in an interdisciplinary way. So why have different classes at all? Neither the students nor the teacher think about these normative questions when they go about their day but that doesn’t mean their choices don’t have normative consequences.

The purpose of this example is to illustrate how institutions shape individual behavior. Institutional culture makes following a normatively bounded path natural and sensible, which hides the fact that there are choices being made.

Obscuring normative choices makes it easier for institutions to resist change because rejecting things that don’t fit the institutional culture will appear to be common sense. People internalize the values of an institution and can act as its immune system against change without recognizing what they're doing. This isn't always a bad thing. Institutions have value. The problem is that institutional cultures are shaped by our society, which is infected with structural inequality and systemic racism. That inequality is reflected, reproduced and magnified by our institutions.

Practically speaking, what does this mean? When working to change an institution, its ability to transmit norms is a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, there will be knee-jerk defensiveness to change because it will be seen as an attack on the integrity of the institution. People will say they want to be anti-racist and genuinely believe it but nevertheless act to reinforce existing norms and thus thwart their own professed goal. On the other hand, if racial equity itself is institutionalized, if the conscious effort to center the experiences of marginalized people is normalized, it has a chance to last.

Step 0 - Just get started
The only real requirement of making institutional change is to get started. Taking action is the best teacher. Books and guides like this one can be helpful but real knowledge comes from trying and doing. You will make mistakes, but nothing will change if nobody pushes for it. One point of caution is to avoid thinking about this process of making institutional change as "leading" change. Instead, the goal is to facilitate a movement that collectively demands it. Not only is a group harder to ignore, this will also give the efforts longevity, which is crucial when tackling systemic and deeply ingrained issues such as racial inequity.

Part 1

​Part 3

A DIY Guide to Institutional Change for Racial Equity

​Step 1 - Evaluate starting conditions
To change an institution, you must understand it. It's hard to plan for something different without knowing how the institution currently functions. Let's talk about the necessary information and how to get it.

1 - A. Decide whether the institution is worth saving. 
It won't always be. Sometimes the only way for an institution to be truly anti-racist is for it to cease to exist.

As a corollary, is there critical mass? While a big part of the work of creating institutional change is convincing people of the necessity for change, protect yourself by honestly evaluating whether there are enough people to share responsibility.

2 - B. Understand the power structure. 
This is more involved than finding the org chart or reading the official bylaws. Always be aware of the important difference between formal authority and actual authority. The person signing checks may not decide what amount goes on the line. Misunderstanding who holds power (and therefore who can enact change), risks misdirecting energy. The person who announces a policy change may not be the one who has control over it. Organizations tend to scapegoat its least powerful members. It is far easier for an institution to punish the person implementing policies than to restructure itself or for leadership to examine their own culpability. For instance, consider a case in which a group of workers bring attention to racially coded HR policies. Institutional leadership might respond by firing or otherwise sanctioning the HR department even though the policies originated higher in the organizational structure and reflect deeper structural issues. Some tips:

• Diagram the power dynamics as you discover them. Visualization is a powerful tool.
  • Guide to mapping your workplace
  • Power mapping
• Pay attention to who sets agendas and who has the power to deviate from them.
• Notice who makes decisions but also note who places people into position to make those decisions. For instance, picking the members of a committee is just as powerful as sitting on the committee.
• Veto power or its equivalent has a deterrent effect. People will go out of their way to avoid being told “no” so don’t ignore someone's veto authority just because they don't seem to use it.
• Consider if authority at a given institution comes from formal powers or from informal channels. Personal relationships are a good example of the latter. People who have been at an institution for a long time may have personal connections that circumvent regular decision-making channels. This might give them more power to influence events, to block change or accelerate it, than would be apparent from their official title or position within the institution.
• Keep an eye out for dysfunction, which is often a feature of the system rather than a flaw. If a practice or policy  makes no sense, it's probably working well for someone. Figure out who. For instance, consider a situation where work assignments are handed out haphazardly, resulting in unequal workload. It may be that the haphazardness hides patterns in who receives larger workloads. Or perhaps the person or group who manages the assignment system gains some benefit through an inefficient system. In any case, remember that dysfunction creates chokepoints and people derive power from controlling them.

1- C. Develop a clear problem statement. 
Having a clear problem statement is important for convincing others and for organizing advocacy. The solution becomes easier to imagine if the problem is stated clearly. Of course, the root cause of racial inequity is racism. But it is good to have a problem statement specific to the organization. This will help guide decision making on what changes to push for. Specificity can also help convince people to join the effort. Even if someone is not committed to the project of racial equity, a good problem statement should still ring true. The work you did to understand the power structure should be helpful. In almost all occasions, you'll find mal-distribution of power is part of the problem.

Take, as an example, an organization doing a poor job recruiting people of color. After examining how the organization recruits, the problem statement might be something like, "We fail to hire candidates of color because our informal recruitment procedures prioritize pre-existing networks that exclude underrepresented populations." This is a simplified example but notice how the problem statement suggests a solution. Though problem statements shouldn't necessarily be tailored to engage this population, note that even people who are not primarily interested in racial equity might agree that an informal recruitment process based on pre-existing networks is exclusionary. One note of caution is that multiple problem statements may be needed. In this case, though the recruitment process is the most direct cause, perhaps it has remained informal despite past opposition due to deeper flaws, such as a leadership team that ignores feedback, particularly from people of color.

1 - D. Strategies for understanding your institution:

• Talk to senior members of the organization. They can help identify power structures and help refine your goals. But be careful of self-selection. A long tenure at an institution often involves becoming desensitized to its flaws. Trust their knowledge but perhaps not their instincts. Take their opinion about how to create change with a grain of salt. The fact that change remains necessary is in part because their attempts failed, even if through no fault of their own.
• Talk to new members of the institution. They have a fresh perspective and can help identify areas of dysfunction. New members are a mirror to senior people. They may not have specific knowledge about a given organization, they probably have good instincts about what is strange or incongruent with past experiences.
• Seek out those with the least power and listen to them. The burdens of inequity fall most heavily upon those at the bottom of a hierarchy, which means anyone with little to no authority probably has a good guess where the problems lie. This probably means talking to the people who are paid least but don’t overlook interns, temp workers, etc. If you are not part of these groups, make sure to invite them to be partners rather than reproducing existing hierarchies. Also be sensitive to the fact that they may not feel able to speak freely.
• Compare the institution with its analogues. Take a look at how similar institutions are organized. What do they do differently, and why? Sometimes it will be an accident of circumstance, but it could also reveal something important about how an institution functions.
  • For example, an institution may promote internally by seniority whereas its analogues promote internally based on a review process. Without more details about how each method is carried out, it is impossible to say which is more equitable. The point is that identifying these disparate promotion procedures offers a focus for further research in understanding how an organization functions. In this case, it would be worth exploring when the institution implemented promotion by seniority, whether this has any influence on the length of individual’s tenure, whether members of underrepresented groups stay long enough to be promoted.
• Find the bylaws, formal procedures, employee handbooks, anything that is written down. Be careful not to take these documents at face value. In fact, when reading through these documents, pay close attention to which aspects are surprising, which procedures are ignored because this can reveal who has the authority to make changes.

Part 2

Part 4

A DIY Guide to Institutional Change for Racial Equity

​Step 2 - Set Expectations
The fight for institutional change is a meat grinder. It wears passionate people down. Setting expectations for the challenges ahead won't guarantee success but can keep people in the fight longer.

2 - A. Understand that this will not have been the first time someone has demanded change. 
Institutions have experience resisting change and inherent immune systems. As discussed above, ensuring continuity over time is one of the key functions of an institution. The history of past efforts is often buried, even if they happened very recently. Dig that history up by talking to senior members as well as those who have left. There may be almost disturbing parallels between previous fights for institutional change and current demands. In researching recommendations on diversity and inclusion efforts, a committee at my law school discovered a longer, more comprehensive report a decade old that documented the same problems and offered the same solutions. Don't let this discourage you. Just because past efforts stalled doesn't mean yours inevitably will. Everything is impossible until it's not. Try to let past efforts inspire instead. The shared struggle is a tie that binds you to those who came before and picking up where they left off is something to be proud of.

2 - B. Most of the time, organizing is incredibly tedious. 
90% of revolution is logistics. Real life doesn't follow narrative conventions and there are no musical montages to speed through the monotonous work. Depending on how things shake out, there may be moments that stir the soul, moments that test your mettle, moments that make the breath catch in your throat. But there are guaranteed to be times of frustration and boredom. Most of organizing is setting up meetings, prepping for meetings, running meetings, following up with people about meetings. Often, the greatest good anyone can do is the logistical and administrative work of keeping people on task and moving everyone along to the next step. This work usually goes unseen and unrewarded and is usually done by marginalized folx. Make a conscious effort to keep an eye on where the burden of keeping the machine running falls and value this work.

2 - C. Expect conflict. 
Even if an institution wants to work to become anti-racist, not everything will be smooth sailing. The patterns and assumptions that help to create inequitable and oppressive systems will not go gently. Don't look to pick a fight, but plan for it.

2 - D. Expect, invite discomfort. 
Fighting to create an anti-racist institution will be uncomfortable.

• For those who are Black or otherwise marginalized, it will be uncomfortable speaking about your own experiences and in some sense, putting them on a scale to be weighed. It requires you to be vulnerable and loud when you've been taught to keep your head down and be 'resilient.' Also, if you speak of your experiences and the institution does not change, it can feel as if you weren't compelling enough. This can be demoralizing and dehumanizing. I hope this does not happen but unfortunately, you need to be prepared for some people to listen to your story and hear your plea but choose to do nothing.
• For those who are white, it will be uncomfortable because you will wonder whether you have contributed to feelings of alienation or whether you could have prevented it. You may start to second guess everything you say. This is part of the process and you should lean into this discomfort, let it grant you urgency rather than sap your strength. Systemic racism cannot be addressed through small tweaks. If it were easy, it would have been done. In fact, there are no shortcuts. There is only the hard, rocky path. Discomfort is a signal that you are walking it.

2 - E. There's a good chance of failure. 
I recommend approaching the project of institutional change with an awareness that failure is possible. This is not an argument to accept half measures or not aspire to structural change. I try to think like a realist and an optimist at the same time. Think like an optimist because if you cannot imagine structural change, it will be more difficult to achieve. But think like a realist as a way of protecting yourself. Recognizing you might fail is a good way to conserve energy in the long term. And as mentioned in the intro, even failure to achieve a specific agenda has knock on benefits.

Part 3

Part 5 

A DIY Guide to Institutional Change for Racial Equity

​Step 3 - Build a Coalition and Get Buy in on Goals
The work of institutional change requires a team. No one can do it alone. Find others who share a commitment to racial equity and are willing to share the burden. A team is necessary to brainstorm ideas, but it is also necessary because this work is tiring. People will need to tap in and out as their motivation ebbs and flows. Respect and account for that in planning. Normalize letting people voice their exhaustion and take a step back. That will result in less burnout in the long run.

3 - A. Build a coalition. 
If institutions are made up of the people within them, there is no real substitute for having a wide coalition of people demanding change together. How to gather this coalition depends on the size of an organization, and your place within it. Sometimes, it will mean sending an email to the organization wide listserv to spur a conversation about race and inequality, then following up with those who respond positively. Sometimes, it will mean having a dozen one on one conversations. Sometimes, it will mean tapping into existing organizational structures such as unions or affinity groups. A preliminary goal can start a broad conversation about how the institution should pursue racial equity. At this initial stage, it isn't necessary for everyone to agree on the same solutions or even for everyone to be committed to structural change to the same degree. However, you do want to look for openness to engaging in conversation and the recognition that racism is . . . bad. Now let's talk about some concrete ways to collect a coalition.

• Call people in by pulling on social connections. Sometimes people only need to be explicitly invited to be part of a movement for change.
• Use technology. Technology lets us reach more people than ever. It can also frame and organize our conversations to reduce the "transaction costs" of starting dialogue about race and institutional change. If your institution has something like Slack or Microsoft Teams, you could create a discussion group about "Race and Inclusion." Or perhaps there is an institution wide listserv to solicit allies to which someone could send anti-racism resources to start a conversation. Be proactive in following up with people who respond and explicitly ask people to get in touch if they want to work on solutions. Once there is a group to start organizing with, use tools like Google groups to create a listserv or otherwise facilitate cohesion. Give the group a name. I wasn't kidding about the logistics.
• Seek out pre-existing communities who may already be organized or may already be interested in promoting racial equity. Affinity groups often offer a space for people to bring up issues of inclusion and discrimination. If your workforce is unionized, they should have organizing capacity and experience to contribute.
• Use pyramid schemes for good. Recruit people to do recruiting. One person can only have so many conversations. But convincing those people to have three more one on one conversations makes an ally of exponential growth.
• Don’t underestimate the value of storytelling. Institutions are impersonal but stories about the ways that existing institutional norms harm individuals can bring things back down to the personal level. Many racial equity efforts start out by collecting stories of examples of racism or listening sessions where people come together to speak about the impact of institutional racism.

3 - B. Find a core team or a personal council. 
Try to pull together a handful of people to speak honestly and openly with, to bounce ideas off of and to vent to. Creating institutional change is first an exercise in creating a community of people who care enough to demand it. Help build spaces where people feel safe to generate ideas and think critically about the ways the institution does and does not support equity and inclusion. This might be the same group as the coalition, but a smaller caucus or caucuses may be useful for in depth discussions.

3 - C. Decide if you need a "champion" and find one. 
Sometimes, it can be helpful to have the support of someone from institutional leadership. They can bring talking points up to others in positions of authority in a way that won’t trigger defensiveness. They can bring back information about how the leadership team is responding. They can help strategize how to bring proposals forward. They can help normalize asking questions about racial equity or raising issues of bias and institutional change. Some things to consider in choosing this person:

• You might want someone at the very top of institutional leadership because they are likely to have formal authority as well as soft power. But this also increases the likelihood of a myopic view of how change should occur. Someone who is in the middle layer of the institutional hierarchy may be better positioned or more flexible.
• You'll want someone who understands their role is to assist the movement rather than to shape it or to dull its demands. Advice on how to frame asks and how to strategize is useful so this isn't to say the champion should be nothing more than a mouthpiece. They should simply understand their elevated position within the institution should not give them a stronger voice in the coalition.

3 - D. Define goals through consensus decision making. 
Arguably, everything until this point is prep work. Goal set early because it provides a guide for making strategic decisions and provides a vision. Try to use consensus decision making to encourage buy in and build a community of people committed to the project of changing the institution for the better. Creating common understandings of the problem and common goals are good steps toward creating that community.

Refer back to the problem statement to help define a goal. Sometimes, as when the power to make decisions is too concentrated and unaccountable, the goal may be clear. Sometimes, as when there is an especially hostile workplace culture reinforced by external forces, the goal won't be so clear. For those not part of those communities, take your cues from marginalized folx. Don’t expect them to take on all the work of defining the goals but also don’t presume to know what they want. This is a VERY hard line to walk and coalitions are made or broken at this step. Again, there are no shortcuts. I can only advise defaulting to compassion and empathy. Even if you don’t belong to a marginalized group, this is your fight too. When in doubt, make sure to do some thinking before bringing anything to partners. But be ready and willing to be told to go back to the drawing board.

Consensus decision making requires openness and trust. When first beginning a push for institutional change, you may not have either, but consensus decision making might help to build both. There are whole guides to making decisions by consensus, more than can be outlined here. The key is people should go into the process with a commitment to working towards a solution that is beneficial to everyone. Usually, decision making occurs through debate or by fiat. Usually, people advocate for a position and they ‘win’ or ‘lose’ depending on whether the final decision reflects their preferences. Consensus decision making is different. While people may have preferred outcomes, all parties should listen actively and work to create a solution everyone has a stake in. Instead of being for or against a position, everyone is invested in supporting each other. Consensus does not mean either unanimity or compromise. Requiring unanimity often means choosing the smallest change everyone can agree on. Compromise seeks to cobble together what are often incompatible extremes. Consensus decision making goes further by trying to combine everyone's most important concerns and best ideas into a coherent whole.

• Seeds for Change Guide
• Basics of Consensus Decision Making

3 - E. If necessary, start small to teach people collective action and consensus is possible. 
Often, the biggest barrier to collective action and consensus decision making is the belief that it is impossible. For people who are taught decisions must be made from a position of authority and in a political system whose founders were afraid of the "masses," it is difficult to imagine a large group with different personalities and interests coming together to reach consensus. In truth, consensus work will always be frustrating, but it becomes easier upon understanding it is possible. If the coalition is accustomed to hierarchical decision making and is not confident in its ability to make concrete change, start small. Experience is the best teacher in this regard. For instance, work on a demand letter together or push for a small, concrete change, something that is already likely to attract broad agreement before moving to more difficult, transformative demands.

Part 4

Part 6

A DIY Guide to Institutional Change for Racial Equity

​Step 4 - Make a Plan and Stay Organized
Organizing is exhausting precisely because it requires planning long before you have sufficient information. It is impossible to be prepared for every eventuality and there will be moments you didn't prepare for, developments that sneak up on you. This can be emotionally devastating. While this section calls for you to make plans, try not to feel bad when and if they fall through.

4 - A. Make a timeline. 
To keep yourself organized, sketch out a timeline with major decision points.

Do this as early as possible. Institutional change takes time. But justice delayed is justice denied. Institutions are experts at foot-dragging. You have to be able to tell the difference between delay designed to wear enthusiasm down and the time needed for ideas to percolate through the institution. It isn't always easy. The more you work on institutional change, the more you understand how an institution works, the more reasonable delay will seem. You'll start to become invested in the formalities and might even believe institutional leadership when they say a reasonable change is impossible because of a procedural rule, as if rules and procedures are not human made. For example, when confronted with evidence that their entrance assessment is disproportionately eliminating Black applicants, a fellowship program claimed that the proper procedures for modifying the assessment would take several years. This may appear reasonable but remember that procedure is supposed to protect people from arbitrary harm. Yet if harm is already occurring, mindlessly following procedure becomes a delay tactic.

Use dates or triggering events as points on the timeline. I use the term 'timeline' loosely. It might be on the scale of weeks and months. Or you might want to organize your timeline in terms of triggering events (i.e. If the demand letter is ignored, then we will issue a public statement. If there is no measurable progress on these three demands by the end of the year, then we will escalate up to the Board of Directors to ask for oversight.).

Each institution is different but here are some general guidelines for what to put on this timeline, keeping in mind not everyone will be comfortable with all of these steps or feel safe engaging in them:

• When to issue a general call for rank and file in the institution to join the push for change.
• When to officially bring concerns to institutional leadership.
• When to escalate up to the Board of Directors (or equivalent).
• When to take things public. This might involve making a statement on social media, going to a newspaper, etc.
• When to walk away. You need to protect yourself because the institution isn't going to. The world tends to entropy and coalitions sometimes fall apart.

Don’t be afraid to publicly embarrass the institution. Sometimes, embarrassment is the only thing that can actually jar an institution into taking racial equity seriously. We are socialized to think that the way to change people’s minds is to make a well reasoned argument backed by evidence. Unfortunately, human psychology and real world evidence don’t bear that out. Remember that institutions are well practiced at resisting change and if ensuring racial equity were simply a matter of making the right argument, plenty of people have articulated the case against racism. Institutions preserve existing hierarchies of power, hide them behind procedures and norms that appear neutral. Institutions also act to maintain their own legitimacy. If an institution is unwilling to respond to reasonable arguments, they may be more willing to act to preserve their own legitimacy i.e. by avoiding embarrassment.

4 - B. Define and clarify roles. 
People will come to the project of institutional change with different comfort levels with conflict, from different positions within the institutional structure. As long as everyone is committed to the end goal of achieving racial equity, a range of views and preferences is beneficial. But keep tabs on who is filling what role. These don’t have to be written down, nor do they have to be static, but it is easier to strategize with some sense of what people are comfortable doing, what tactical role they're filling. To get you started, here are some possible roles, keeping in mind they need to be adapted to fit the institution:

• Facilitators - people who keep the movement organized by finding meeting times, producing agendas and facilitating meetings.
• Influencers - people who use their social connections or communication skills to talk to people who are not yet part of the movement for institutional change.
• Back-channelers - people with some sway with institutional leaders, who may be able to speak to them on a personal level. Note: be careful to use this in a way that complements the goals derived through consensus decision making.
• Public Speakers - depending on the size of an institution, people willing and able to in front of a crowd may be needed.
• Auditors - sometimes people get tired but still have bandwidth to act as advisors or do a gut check of what the group decides.
• Marshals - when things stall, you might need someone who is willing to be absolutely candid, harshly honest. The status quo is comfortable, for some. Sometimes, you need to jar people out of that complacency.

4 - C. Set up structure but not hierarchy. 
This is related to the point about defining roles but is a bit more involved. Structure allows clear division of responsibility and helps with strategic planning. But structure  does not require hierarchy. For instance, someone needs to facilitate meetings, but the role can rotate. Structure actually offers flexibility and freedom because it helps to ensure everyone is clear on their responsibilities and makes efficient coordination possible. Note that being in a coalition without hierarchy doesn't mean that there are no leaders. Being part of a leaderless movement requires everyone to be a leader.

• Make use of working groups. To maintain a coalition, strike a balance between consensus building and progress on goals arrived at through consensus. Once a coalition is built, the following structure has worked in the past. Bi-weekly all-members meetings to check for consensus and to brainstorm as a coalition. In the interim, working groups split off to address specific tasks or to further develop specific ideas. Working groups should have significant autonomy but document thinking processes through meeting notes/proposals or at least be ready to talk about reasoning. Working groups then report back to the entire coalition during the bi-weekly meetings and settle on new goals.
• Be conscious of where the administrative burdens fall. Pay attention to whether it’s always the same handful of people volunteering to take meeting notes and brainstorming items for the agenda.

4 - D. Take advantage of galvanizing moments. 
Structural change tends to happen all at once rather than incrementally, when the relevant population is galvanized into action. It is difficult to predict when these moments occur. But staying organized has two benefits. First, it creates conditions that are more conducive to these galvanizing moments. Second, staying organized helps lay the groundwork so that these moments can be harnessed to move structural changes ahead.

4 - E. Run effective meetings. 
Meetings are often seen as the peak of bureaucratic torture but face to face interaction is also how we form the human connections that allow us to begin and sustain movements for change. When they go right, they can galvanize people into action, channel passion into concrete action, generate consensus and buy in. Meetings result in deadlines, which can lead to momentum. Running effective meetings does not mean there won’t be times when they go off the rails. Sometimes the nature of collective action is chaos. That being said, here are some basic principles to channel that chaos:

• Tips for facilitating meetings 
• Always go in with a goal and come out with concrete next steps.
• Prepare an agenda (simple example below) and try to estimate time to be spent on each item. Set aside time in the beginning to deal with administrative matters such as note-taking and process. Leave time at the end to discuss next steps.
• Properly framing and defining the purpose of the meeting is important. Sometimes a meeting is held to brainstorm in a free-form way. Other times a meeting is held  to achieve consensus on next steps. Or the meeting might be called to come up with a concrete plan. State the purpose of the meeting up front during the time for "administrative matters" so everyone is on the same page.
• Put someone in charge of moving through the agenda and cycling this responsibility, even if someone is particularily good at facilitating. That person could serve as co-facilitator to be on call when necessary.
• The proper balance of free discussion and efficiency is hard to achieve but try to get to every single section of the agenda, even if it is a very brief and superficial overview, even if you have to cut off productive discussion a little early.
• If necessary, implement some variation of progressive stack (noting down who wishes to speak, prioritizing those who belong to marginalized groups). This can be clunky in practice and the same ends might be achieved by verbally reminding people to consider how often they are speaking and whether someone else might know more about a topic before speaking.
• If someone dominates the conversation or the dialogue is going in circles during what is supposed to be a goal-oriented section of the agenda, don't be afraid to cut people off. Be polite but firm.
• Have someone, likely one of the facilitators, summarize the conclusions of the meeting at the end, right before action steps are handed out. This helps to reinforce consensus and remind people why they are sitting in this meeting. It can refocus attention on the issues and encourage people to volunteer for action steps.
• Learn some basic negotiation tactics. A lot of meetings will be negotiations, either with institutional leadership or even with allies. There’s no need to be an expert but at the very least, make sure to know the best alternative to a negotiated agreement. Don't accept anything less.

4 - F. Example of a meeting agenda.
I. Administrative matters (5 mins)
        i. Goal: communicate form and function of the meeting, which is to outline a plan for pushing reform
        ii. Note-taking
        iii. Explain how the meeting will run
                a. Progressive stack might be implemented if necessary
                b. This meeting is goal oriented so we will try to stick to estimated timing
II. Refine asks (10 mins)
        i. Goal: Explore outer bonds of our demands and refine them into concrete proposals
        ii. Use demand letter as a starting point
        iii. Articulate the main demands
        iv. Any additional demands?
        v. Establish buy in on finalized list (to be shared with/ratified by other allies)
III. Strategy discussion (30 mins)
        i. Goal: resolve strategy questions and settle on a rough schedule (again, to be ratified by those not at the meeting) for escalation if demands are ignored
        ii. Discrete strategy questions
                a. How to bring those not at this meeting into this discussion
                b. Whether and how to use the management team as inside allies
                c. Is a demand letter with sign ons our first step?
        iii. What should the escalation ladder include and what order might they be in?
IV. Delegate out tasks and housekeeping (5 mins)
        i. Goal: Arrive at concrete next steps/responsibilities with deadlines

Part 5 

Part 7

A DIY Guide to Institutional Change for Racial Equity

​Step 5 - Avoid Common Pitfalls
Part of recognizing that fights for racial equity have always been happening is understanding why they stalled in the past. The complete answer is too complex for a document like this. Instead, here are some common pitfalls, challenges to watch out for. Again, these may not come from people who are actively hostile to the project of racial equity. Sometimes, they come from people who want the same ends but don't realize they are playing into the hands of institutionalized racism.

 5 - A. Beware of delay disguised as information gathering. 
Look out for calls to "gather more information," often through the avenue of forming a committee. We don’t need any more information about why change is necessary. We probably don’t even need information on what needs to change. Committees are only useful if they have clear authority and the explicit goal of implementing reforms. Information gathering is a favorite of people who would like to avoid structural, institutional reform. Though it sounds responsible and proactive, it often turns into foot-dragging. 

5 - B. Beware of outside consultants hired to make recommendations. 
Often, consultants are brought on not to discover wholly new information but to provide cover for decision-makers. Even if institutional leadership is sincere, the process of hiring a consultant, briefing them, and waiting for their research is another way an institution's immune system creates delay. Institutional leadership will be tempted to hire a consultant because 1) it seems like a concrete step in the right direction 2) it absolves them of responsibility and 3) they're confused and would like someone to give them friendly, professionally packaged recommendations. If leadership says they need a consultant to make recommendations for changes, this is really another way of saying existing voices within the institution are not credible. At most institutions, if you gave the person with the least authority a pencil, a piece of paper, and five minutes, they could come up with a list of problems and recommendations. In a sense, the solutions are already known. The question is whether there is enough will to implement them. This brings us to a caveat to this warning. It might be in your interest to bring in an outside consultant for the same reason leadership would -- to provide cover, to diffuse conflict by introducing an external, theoretically neutral party. Be careful and try to get as many of the following as possible:

• Make sure to have a role in the search and hiring of the consultant.
• Make sure the consultant's work output will go not just to management but to the coalition as well. Ideally, the consultant should be reporting out publicly or at least to the entire institution rather than only to management.
• Make sure there are deadlines, publicly acknowledged.
• Ideally, the consultant won't be coming to investigate problems but rather to help implement specific solutions.

5 - C. Beware of backlash. 
There's not much to do about this except keep an eye out for it. Sometimes, people become overwhelmed when confronted with how deep institutional problems run. Unable to cope with this reality, they instead deny it and lash out at those who tried to lift the veil as troublemakers.

5 - D. Beware of training your way out. 
Diversity trainings can be part of the solution, but they cannot be the whole solution. Handled poorly, they can even be counterproductive. Even expressly anti-racism trainings tend to address personal biases, but the core problems are structural, cultural in nature.

5 - E. Beware of tone policing. 
Anyone feeling uncomfortable with how someone else is expressing their anger or frustration, should pause and try to empathize rather than correct. Recognize you probably know far less than you think. Recognize there isn't some objective best way to create change. Recognize standards of civility and professionalism are gendered, racialized, and designed to exclude. If you find yourself trying to police someone's tone, think about what you are doing. You would be forcing those who are suffering to argue and debate with you about how change should take place. You would be forcing them to spend their time, energy, and emotion arguing with you. While you may not realize it, you would be acting out the institution's immune response. Instead, reflect on who is and is not allowed to be angry. Reflect on whose needs are anticipated and addressed before anger becomes necessary.

5 - F. Beware of bad faith. 
Most strategies about coalition building and consensus decision making assume people are interested in changing the institution. There may be some who operate in bad faith. It can sometimes be difficult to tell if someone is still learning how collective decision-making works so try to give as much benefit of the doubt as possible.

5 - G. Beware of co-optation. 
Narratives about increasing diversity to achieve racial equity can be co-opted into efforts to increase “intellectual diversity” instead. I’ve heard people use the language of “marginalized groups” to center the experiences of remote office workers in the middle of a discussion about racial equity. One way (by no means foolproof) to combat this is being especially precise in saying exactly what the changes the meant to achieve and who they assist.

5 - H. Beware of other forms of bias that can creep in such as classism or ableism. 
Be intentional about being inclusive in building the coalition. For instance, if you are a lawyer at a legal advocacy organization, have you included the paralegals or the administrative assistants?

5 - I. Beware of certainty. 
It's good practice to be slightly mistrustful of anyone who is absolutely certain something will or won't work. The world is complicated and certainty is usually a sign someone is overfitting data. Consider why they might believe this, whether their individual experiences might be shaping this certainty.

5 - J. Beware of cosmetic changes.
Especially if a coalition has force of numbers , institutional leadership may be eager to appease. They will offer to take some concrete steps and might even do this out of a genuine desire to address racial inequity. But just because formal policies changed does not mean the situation has necessarily improved. Brown v. Board of Education declared school segregation unconstitutional and yet our education system remains intensely segregated. Don't take your eye off what’s important. The question is whether the lived experience of marginalized folx improved, whether the culture of the institution changed.

5 - K. Beware of doing labor without commitment. 
Members of marginalized groups are often asked to assist with implementing anti-racism measures. There is nothing inherently wrong wth this but be careful to do labor on an institution’s behalf only when there are concrete commitments to act. One reason for this is that if your coalition is strong enough for the institution to negotiate and ask for help, you are in a position of power because that means they need your labor and agreement more than you need them. Second, in certain cases, doing labor on behalf of an institution can even be counterproductive and be used as a defense mechanism against real, structural change. This is how it works. First, a coalition demands change. The institution signals their agreement that change is necessary and invites the coalition to work with them on finding a solution, perhaps through the formation of a joint committee. The members of the coalition on the committee end up doing a lot of emotional labor, assisting the institution to identify the problems. Recommendations are made and perhaps some superficial, small changes do occur but no structural, transformative change. When the institution is next questioned about their commitment to racial equity, they point to the work of the committee as evidence that they have been proactive and as a way to resist taking more transformative steps.

Part 6 

Part 8