Projects
We develop and carry out community-based projects that address injustices through collective empowerment. Our projects align with our areas of interest and we prioritize work that tackles interconnected issues.
The Pivot Centre for Collective Action is organizing an inter-city forum on Eco-gentrification, to be held on April 26th 2024 in Montreal .
The objective of the Forum is to provide communities impacted by ecogentrification with an opportunity to discuss issues of economic and social exclusion linked to greening initiatives, and specifically the displacement of people living with low incomes from neighbourhoods where greening and beautification projects have been carried out. These discussions will help create links between communities and identify strategies.
Participants at the Forum will share their experiences of ecogentrification, as well as practices and strategies (especially ones that have already been implemented) that have the potential to mitigate the negative impacts of greening projects.
This first discussion will be followed by a second collaborative strategy session in Montreal in November 2024, leading to the publication of a “Strategy Library” intended for community-based groups, municipal governments and funders with resources to help plan and-or advocate for greening projects that limit or completely avoid displacement of low-income residents, as well as resources for connecting with other communities that have been impacted by ecogentrification.
Please contact us for more information.
Frontlines and Fencelines
This project seeks to explore ways to connect with communities and individuals across Turtle Island who do not consider themselves a part of a movement - they are on the front lines of environmental protection because there is no other choice. Our motivation to explore this topic comes from our lived and professional experiences. We share a sense of being, on one hand, alone with our local, neighborhood-level struggles and, on the other, a part of a repeated, systemic pattern of place-based injustice.
To break our isolation and expose this systemic injustice, we seek to meet with ordinary people taking action on local issues, especially in industrial-adjacent communities. These same communities are often the most deeply impacted by environmental destruction currently and will likely be hit the hardest with the impacts of climate change. People who live in these impacted communities are often working class or poor, and disproportionately BIPOC. Their stories are not often told by mainstream environmental organizations or media, and when they do get attention, it’s often through other people speaking for them.
We are asking ourselves: what if these individuals and communities were connected? What could be possible if we could see each other, talk to each other? What will we learn from one another? What tools and wisdom will we share? What ideas will we dream up that will disrupt the systems and structures that are set up to leave some people behind? How could we challenge each other, build solidarity across differences and geographies, and begin to prepare together for future crises?
We are framing this initial exploration phase as a community-driven research project that seeks to both gather stories and build the interpersonal connections that we hope will lay the foundations for subsequent phases of knowledge sharing, mutual support and collective action.
To get involved, collaborate or receive more information, please contact us.