1. Home
  2. Students
  3. Chapter 35 - Organizing Bike Commuters to Work for Change

Chapter 35 - Organizing Bike Commuters to Work for Change

Elizabeth Wilhoit

Synopsis

Cliff and Christine organize the annual Bike-to-Work Day event for the adjoining Midwestern cities of Collegetown and Park City. The two cities do not have much biking infrastructure and Cliff and Christine are politically active in advocating for changes in biking policy and increased infrastructure. They hope that there will be a big group of bike commuters at the event to show the local mayors and university president who attend the event that lots of people bike and would benefit from better policies and infrastructure. Additionally, at the Bike-to-Work Day event, Cliff and Christine hope to recruit other bike commuters to become more politically involved. However, they find that although most bike commuters would appreciate better bike infrastructure, policies, and culture, they bike for personal reasons and are not interested in becoming politically active.

Keywords: Collective Organizing, Coordination, Social Movements, Politics, Biking, Materiality

Key Takeaways and Take a Stand Form

Key Takeaways

  1. Organizing does not always take place within the context of formal organizations.
  2. When a large number of people show up and make themselves present, that presence can communicate and send a message.
  3. One challenge for organizing and organizations can be that people have different motivations for affiliating with that organization and therefore see their role in the organization or even the goal of the organization differently.
  4. There are many personal activities that take place on the edges of organizations and can enter organizations (i.e., fashion preferences, what one eats for lunch, one’s transportation choices). In some cases, these can be the source of friendship as one learns about their colleagues and develops a common bond, but in other cases they can be a source of tension and become politicized.
  5. The ways that people act and the material artifacts that they associate with themselves can communicate about that person. The same goes for organizations.

Take a Stand Form