Processes of Community Building We Do Well!

Community Building is something each of us already does, in our teams, our Local Groups and beyond. You should be able to recognise yourself and those you know in the processes laid out here.

Key Processes of Community Building

The following 13 Processes of Community Building were identified in the research stage of the 2025 Strategy Process. Each can be clearly seen across a variety of spaces in XR and all of them come together to create our collective community.

  1. Trust Building & Mending
  2. Clear Communication
  3. Connection Building
  4. Creating Permeable Boundaries
  5. Shared Purpose
  6. Creating Safe Spaces
  7. Inclusive Decision Making
  8. Creative Expression
  9. Sharing Ideas and Skills
  10. Building Common Culture
  11. Wellbeing and Rest
  12. Negotiating Effectiveness
  13. Celebration and Acknowledgement

We will look at these processes each in turn, exploring where we do them for ourselves within XR, where we do them to bridge and build community externally, and what we can do to strengthen that which we already do.

1. Trust Building & Mending

We build trust between each other, within our structure, between XR and our allies, and we build an external sense of trust in the movement. Communities are built at the speed of trust!

This Can Look Like:

And Externally:

When we are in community with people there are always going to be mistakes made and moments where trust is broken. How we come together after these missteps is so important.

❓ Questions

  • What do you and your groups currently do to build trust?
  • How do you approach each other when trust is broken?

2. Clear Communication

Figuring out how to communicate clearly is challenging, especially in large, diverse groups, especially in spaces where participation and membership fluctuates.

Too many methods of communication creates confusion and with too few people don't know what is going on.

XR uses a variety of structures and processes to communicate internally and externally. When these work well the work of activism is easier. However, when these miss the mark trust erodes and confusion/misinformation spreads.

It's a balance! We need enough clear communication channels but not too many as to overwhelm people!

This Can Look Like:

And Externally:

Remember listening is also a part of clear communication

❓ Questions

  • How does your group communicate in person and digitally? Does this change on actions?
  • How does your group address misunderstandings? Do these happen often?
  • As a group, how do you communicate with the wider world?

3. Connection Building

Connection to people, an organisation, or idea comes before trust. This happens person to person and at a human scale.

Connection is also how people maintain trust between each other and this works best through face to face time spent together and shared experience. Connection can also be the practical links between circles and out to the wider world.

It all starts with curiosity!

This Can Look Like:

And Externally:

A good starting place is to hold a Gift Circle.

❓ Questions

  • How do you build friendship networks outside of activism?
  • What does being connected to a broader community outside of your group look like?

4. Creating Permeable Boundaries

The boundary of any group or community should be permeable, that is it should be easy to join, leave, and return. This creates a welcoming space for new people, acknowledges the complexities in our lives, and allows the sharing of skills, experiences and talents. Also, the boundaries that create the group identity should be clear, that is if there are reasons for denying access or behaviours the group will not accept that needs to be well communicated. We welcome everyone, and every part of everyone, but not every behaviour.

Considering group boundaries, and how people experience them, is key to creating an accessible and welcoming space. Some people may have more barriers to participation than others and if a group is homogeneous then someone entering who does not fit that description will face challenges the group cannot see.

This Can Look Like:

And Externally:

By opening our arms wide and building connection and trust with our local communities and other communities of Identity, Interest, Practice, Place and Action we start to create that cultural momentum!

❓ Questions

  • How do you welcome people into the group? How do you welcome people back if they leave?
  • Who is the group visible to? How do people find you physically or digitally?

5. Shared Purpose

Our communities are typically Communities of Action, it is our shared sense of purpose that ties us together. This shared purpose is held between our Demands, Principles & Values and Strategy, and the details shift with campaigns, localities and time. Purpose can also be smaller and more goal focused and co-created by a group.

In XRUK circles this shared purpose is consensually distributed by mandates through the organism using our Self Organising System. This allows rebels working in seemingly distant parts of the movement to know that they are all pushing in the same direction.

We can see the same distribution of roles towards a common goal in our Local Groups, although this is usually more fluid as local campaigns ebb and flow.

This Can Look Like:

And Externally:

By finding where purpose overlaps we can find fertile ground to build community and co-create actions with other groups.

❓ Questions

  • What are the specific aims and goals of your group?
  • What moments have felt most purposeful to your group?
  • How are the group goals decided? What opportunities are there to make that process more inclusive?

6. Creating Safe Spaces

Different people have different ideas of what a Safe Space looks like. The process of negotiating, adapting, and creating such spaces generates understanding of each other and community care.

We aim to create spaces where it is safe to share our ideas, to be authentic, and also to disagree with each other. We also interact in various different spaces: In meetings, socially, online, in action etc. In each of these contexts safety can mean different things.

This Can Look Like:

And Externally:

Noting also that safety doesn't mean free from discomfort. We look to challenge but to do so with kindness, compassion and understanding.

❓ Questions

  • Who is most at home in your spaces and who might struggle?
  • What do group members need from each other to feel safe in a meeting / action / social environment or digital space?
  • If a space becomes unsafe for someone how does the group change it?

7. Inclusive Decision Making

Communities and individuals within them make decisions all the time, about what they care about and how they act. These can be made in hundreds of different ways.

For a community to be inclusive, decision making processes need to be too. Being part of a community with strong inclusive decision making practices supports individuals to make more communal and less individualised decisions in general.

How our decision making processes adapt and change to the needs of the community participating in them is important.

This Can Look Like:

And Externally:

Decision making in the everyday life of a community can be seen as co-creating democracy for each other all the time.

❓ Questions

  • How does your group make simple / challenging decisions?
  • How does your group include new people in decision making?
  • What is an example of a decision your group made well? What made it a good process?

8. Creative Expression

The ability to be creative is important for any community. Creativity is integral to expressing culture, generating ideas, interest and engagement, as well as self expression and imagining the future.

Creativity is not just about artistic expression but creativity in expression of views and ways of thinking. Creativity can be found in how we plan, how we choose targets, and how inventive we are with our tactics.

Part of creative expression is self expression too. Holding a variety of ways to express creativity can make a community more inclusive and allow space for sharing and experimenting with ideas.

This Can Look Like:

And Externally:

It is only through our creativity that we will survive.

❓ Questions

  • How does your group express itself creatively?
  • What forms of creativity are present already in your group?
  • How could your group encourage creative thinking?

9. Sharing Ideas and Skills

When someone joins a community they bring their skills and ideas with them whether they choose to share them or not. People do not arrive as blank slates to be moulded into rebels.

Sharing skills and ideas is a form of power sharing in communities. The ability to do so with respect and trust that they will not be misused is important in mitigating power. The more our skills, tasks and knowledge is shared between people the stronger and more resilient our communities become.

An essential part of skill and idea sharing is having a safe space to share and learn.

This Can Look Like:

And Externally:

To build power in our communities sharing skills is vital, if only one person knows how something is done that is a clear vulnerability to address.

❓ Questions

  • Are there people in the group who easily share their skills and knowledge?
  • Do members of your group have unexpected skills?
  • Who in the wider community can you ask for help from?

10. Building Common Culture

Our culture is the stories we tell, the visual and musical language we share, the behaviours we endorse and exclude, the actions we take, and the visions of the future we share. Belonging is hard to quantify but it is an experience born of participating in and co-creating shared culture. A key part of this are the stories we tell!

These stories can be a shared mythology or memory as well as expectations for behaviour and imagining about the future. The visual, verbal, musical languages a community uses are as important as the stories themselves.

Who has the ability to tell the stories and build them says a lot about the community. As does how people are able to express their individual identity as part of the whole community.

This Can Look Like:

And Externally:

Everyone in our community is involved in creating our common culture and generating a sense of belonging.

❓ Questions

  • Are there ways of doing things that are unique to this group?
  • How long did it take you to feel a sense of belonging with this group?
  • What is the "Most XR" thing you have ever seen and what made it so?

11. Wellbeing and Rest

In extreme weather events such as heatwaves it is the quality of connections that a person has, not their access to services that ensures survival[1]. Joining and being a valued member of a community is not limited to moments of crisis, and communities can in fact build alternatives to crises.

For a community of climate activists the role that communities play in enabling wellbeing and rest for its members has to be taken very seriously. Burnout is a major issue in activism and the activities activism demands of individuals can be very extractive. Being intentional as a community to value wellbeing and rest of members is key.

This Can Look Like:

And Externally:

So much of activism can be framed around sacrifice and heroism, but is this what we want? We can also frame it around joy and rest and giving each other the permission to do things differently, sustainably and regeneratively.

❓ Questions

  • How does this group look out for the wellbeing of its members?
  • Rest can take many forms for different people; what is the best way for you to rest in different circumstances?
  • How does the group make room for grief and all the emotions that come with caring about the climate and ecological emergency?

12. Negotiating Effectiveness

Communities create measures of success for themselves: long and short term goals against which their efforts are measured - success in stories not just numbers.

An action might be considered effective if there is a marked change in activities of the target, or because loads of people turned up, or because it got a lot of press attention, which measure do we choose as the most effective? And who gets to choose which successes are shouted about?

All these measures of effectiveness are negotiated all the time without even realising it.

This Can Look Like:

And Externally:

As communities we get to define what success and effectiveness mean to us. It will look different across the movement but with us all taking positive steps in our shared purpose we will continue to create change toward our collective vision.

❓ Questions

  • Who decides whether an activity is effective or not?
  • What is the most effective action your group has taken part in or organised?
  • How does your group share its successes, and learn from its failures?

13. Celebration and Acknowledgement

Celebrating and acknowledging the work of members of a group, not just the wins, is an easy way to build community in every circle or group. And beyond this, celebrating the existence of group members regardless of the work they offer.

In doing so people learn from each other and understand each other's strengths, not just the issues they face. This is important as it is often the failures that stick in the mind and define a group. A smooth running experience or process is one that can go unnoticed and therefore it is most important to recognise it: it does so due to the work of others!

This works similarly when connecting with other people and groups outside of XR, appreciating their work or seeking understanding of it is a great way to build connection and community with others.

This Can Look Like:

And Externally:

Each and every one of us on this journey is worth celebrating.

❓ Questions

  • Who does the work of keeping your community together?
  • How do you celebrate each other in your group?
  • Is there someone you want to thank for the work that they do?

[1]: "Fatal Isolation: The Devastating Paris Heat Wave of 2003" by Richard C. Keller

Revision #10
Created 19 June 2025 10:45:36 by raenyah
Updated 25 June 2025 19:49:02 by raenyah