A new guide published by Community Organisers, Organising for Organisations, offers a timely and practical contribution to the wider movement for democratic renewal, collective voice, and community-led change. Though aimed primarily at organisations interested in embedding community organising within their work, the insights and practices outlined in this resource resonate strongly with the ambitions and challenges faced by community media advocates and developers.
Community organising, as set out in this guide, is not an abstract ideal or a symbolic gesture—it is a grounded, relational practice focused on listening, connecting, and acting with people to build their collective power. This makes it an essential resource for those of us committed to community media as a tool not just for expression, but for meaningful social participation and long-term civic transformation.
At the heart of Organising for Organisations is a commitment to community capacity building. It lays out the foundations of a process rooted in local relationships, leadership development, and equitable participation. This is directly aligned with the principles of the foundational economy, in which the focus is not on market-led growth or performative activism, but on meeting everyday social needs and strengthening the core infrastructures of community life.
For community media projects, this guide offers a clear rationale for prioritising relationship-building and deliberative dialogue over metrics or branding. It supports an orientation towards slow, patient, and sustained work that emerges from the specific realities of people’s lives—something all too often overlooked in top-down media campaigns or short-term communications initiatives.
The guide’s emphasis on listening—authentically, openly, and without pre-set agendas—is especially significant. Community media, when practised with care and integrity, is already well positioned to carry out this kind of work. Whether through radio interviews, podcast conversations, participatory video, or local storytelling, the goal is not to extract stories for display, but to make space for meaningful discussion and reflection. This is what makes community media distinct from either commercial broadcasting or ideological messaging: it is accountable to its participants and embedded in the practical, lived realities of place.
By drawing on the different organising models outlined—grassroots, issue-based, identity-based, and more—community media groups can consider how their work fits within broader organising efforts. For example, neighbourhood radio stations might take inspiration from grassroots campaigns to connect with those who feel unheard, while campaign-focused media collectives might benefit from a deeper grounding in listening practices before setting advocacy agendas. Similarly, identity-based media projects can apply the principles of centring those with the least power in ways that build leadership, not dependency.
The report also helps clarify a central tension in our sector: the difference between ideology-led campaigns and capacity-led development. While some initiatives frame change through abstract ideals or urgent calls for transformation, this guide reminds us that real empowerment comes from shared process, collective action, and local knowledge. This is particularly important in community communications, where trust, credibility, and continuity are earned—not asserted.
In practical terms, the guide outlines how to support community organisers with training, supervision, mentoring, and peer support. These approaches can easily be adapted to community media. Presenters, producers, and volunteers in local media projects similarly benefit from safe, structured spaces to reflect, learn, and share their experiences. In doing so, we can create a more resilient infrastructure for participation—one that is sustainable, collaborative, and democratically owned.
Moreover, the insights on managing expectations and building internal organisational buy-in are highly applicable to community media development. Too often, media projects are under pressure to deliver short-term outputs without adequate investment in the relational groundwork that underpins genuine engagement. This guide makes a strong case for resisting those pressures and instead valuing the slow, careful process of trust-building and mutual accountability.
Community media’s strength lies in its capacity to host discussion, support deliberation, and amplify storytelling. It is not merely a channel for distributing content, but a social space in which people can make sense of their world, engage with others, and take action on the issues that matter to them. When rooted in the organising principles outlined in this report, these platforms become not only more inclusive, but more impactful. They move beyond representation to participation—beyond communication to co-creation.
Organising for Organisations offers more than a set of recommendations. It provides a coherent framework for embedding democratic principles into the everyday practices of engagement. For community media advocates, it affirms what we already know: that meaningful communication begins with listening, and that real power is shared—not granted.
As we continue to explore the role of community media in supporting democratic culture and local development, this guide offers valuable tools and a strong foundation. It invites us to think long-term, act relationally, and build media platforms that not only reflect communities but help shape their future.
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If you’re working in community media and want to explore how these ideas can inform your practice, join the conversation at Decentered Media’s community network, and help us shape a decentralised, democratic media ecology grounded in care, participation, and local capacity.