Challenge Corporate Power: Issue Committee Invitation

April 2005 Challenge Corporate Power Update!

The Challenge Corporate Power, Assert the People's Rights Campaign is dedicated to understanding how corporations use their illegitimate constitutional “rights” and powers to define our law, politics, jurisprudence, work, technologies, food, communities... you name it! The Campaign does this through learning and helping others to learn how we got into this mess through the discovery and study of hidden histories with an eye toward rethinking WILPF activism by placing it in the context of people’s right to self and mutual governance and uncovering the meaning of real (radical) democracy along with developing its skills and practice.

Order the 10-session study packet!
Order the Abolish Corporate Personhood Organizing Packet!

Download the 10-session study packet in html and PDF form!
Download the Abolish Corporate Personhood Organizing Packet!

Articles and Other Readings from the CCP, APR Campaign

The major tools of the campaign, the study curriculum and strategy/action materials prepared by our campaign, continue to provide opportunities for WILPF members to establish study groups in branches/communities and reframe local campaigns against corporate harms in the language and strategy of citizen sovereignty and radical democracy.

Various CCP, APR folks are furthering ordinances in No. California to keep water in the public realm; in Arcata, California and the state of Arizona against Corporate Personhood. We continue to respond to and network with people/organizations contacting us regarding many aspects of this work. Committee Leadership Team Member Jan Edwards did a timeline-based presentation at an October labor conference in CA. She later presented a workshop in Utah with a POCLAD principal on the the subject, “Kicking Corporations Out of the Constitution." Committee Leadership Team Member Virginia Rasmussen traveled to Arizona in early March for several days with WILPFers in Tucson and Phoenix.

Study groups are thriving in Des Moines, Tucson and Phoenix, thanks to good work by WILPF members in those cities. Tucson, under the enthusiastic leadership of Joyce Smith and Pat Birnie, are making local access radio appearances, holding film and video showings, and doing study groups-Part 2 known as Democracy Ownership Groups.

The film, "The Corporation", is now available on DVD and being promoted as a means to engage communities in discussion/learning.

Although the campaign will be transitioning to the role of Issue Committee for WILPF's 2005-2008 program cycle, the CCP,APR committee will continue to provide information and support for those wanting to: (1) advocate for resolutions or ordinances against “Corporate Personhood”(or resolutions/ordinances against specific corporate activities) in local municipalities; (2) advocate for state laws and constitutional amendments that limit corporate power, corporate activities and corporate civil rights; and (3) develop community organizing strategies essential to this work. See Issue Committee Invite to become involved!

More information about the Campaign
Challenge Corporate Power, Asserting the People's Rights is one of US-WILPF's three national campaigns. Phase I of the campaign has been education using the technique of study groups, which have been convening all over the country since October 1999. Participants include WILPF members as well as non-members.

The study groups are structured into ten sessions. Participants receive materials to read on their own, and then they come together as a group to discuss their reactions and ideas. (There's no advance preparation required for the introduction session.) The focus is on process as much as content, as groups are encouraged to pratice democracy in their interactions and explore just what that means. At the end of the ten sessions, groups can decide if they'd like to continue meeting, take action, or disband.

With feedback from the initial participants, the study group materials have been cleaned up, expanded, and revised and are now available on this website.

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