As our work has expanded, our staff has grown and our politics have sharpened, we choose lean on Community Accountability more than ever before.
Since our founding in 2015, four core values have oriented our work: Radical Love; Southern Synergy; Autonomy and Self-Determination; and Collective Power. These values informed and guided how ARC-Southeast’s team has shown up for reproductive justice in the South. They were seeds that helped us generate a model for community-centered care rooted in reproductive justice AND abolition.
Our work has evolved over time, we’ve adapted to meet our community’s changing needs and to confront the changing political climate. Given how our team has grown, our services have expanded and our politics have sharpened, we refreshed our values so they better reflect ARC-SE at year 10.
We kept two of our original four values, Radical Love, and Autonomy and Self-Determination, but changed their definitions in significant ways. We replaced Collective Power with Community Accountability and Southern Synergy with Building Southern Power. We’re rolling out this blog series to share our revisions, what they mean for our work and our staff.
Let’s break down down what Community Accountability means to us.
How ARC-SE Defines Community Accountability
We’re reimagining responsibility and care WITH our community because we work for YOU.
As the most restricted fund in the South, we understand the gravity of being accountable to the RJ framework in all that we do and that all of our efforts (personal and collective) will have an impact. Our alignment is with the needs of the community and not the state. We hold ourselves accountable through honesty, transparency, and informed consent to our communities.
We are sunsetting the use of collective power and replacing it with community accountability as well as building southern power. Holding ourselves accountable to the people we serve is what ensures our care, programs are reflective of the times and useful for our people. It encourages us to continuously stretch and learn as a staff. Meanwhile we wanted to clarify that the power we build is distinctly Southern–including the Southeast United States and the Global South.
What Community Accountability Means for ARC-SE Staff, in Practice
We work to embody Community Accountability by first acknowledging how it was practiced within the Black, radical, Southern and queer political lineage we uphold.
“In many ways, the work ARC-Southeast does can be understood through the lens of ‘survival programs’, a practice of groups like the Black Panther Party, Young Lords, and the Mississippi Freedom Farmers. In essence, it means we provide means of support and survival through community organizing where the state is failing our people,” said staff person Eva D.
From there, our staff has identified what this means practically within their distinct roles as we also discern what this means in practice for the collective.
“Community accountability looks like rigor in this work,” Eva added. “We show up with rigorous standards because our communities have been abandoned and are relying on us to fill the void created by the state.”
As an organization, we plan to put this into deeper practice externally by:
- Communicating how much of ARC’s budget goes directly towards funding abortion
- Establishing a values alignment checklist for funders, vendors and partner organizations
- Creating a channel to receive and incorporate feedback from the community
At the same time we intend to internally wield community accountability by:
- Clarifying staff roles to delineate responsibilities
- Providing more opportunities for staff to name needs and ask for support
- Involving all staff in intentional and strategic decision-making
- Communicating clear and pre-established internal conflict resolution process
Here’s to closing the gap between what we believe and how we move!
If Community Accountability is as important to you as it is to us, consider becoming a monthly support of ARC-Southeast. We’ll stay accountable to supporting our neighbors and being transparent, and you’ll stay accountable to supporting your local abortion fund every month.